Key takeaways

  • Final favourability poll for Keir Starmer finds 28% positive and 64% negative opinion
  • 51% say he was a poor or terrible prime minister
  • Britons most likely to cite foreign affairs when asked the best thing Starmer has done
  • Winter fuel allowance, u-turns, and "everything" top the list of Starmer's worst moves, with Labour voters also likely to include Gaza
  • Weakness and indecision are the negative traits the public most associate with Starmer

With Keir Starmer’s final day as prime minister expected to be Monday next week, YouGov data reveals how the British public feel about the outgoing prime minister.

At the very end of his time in office, only 28% of Britons have a favourable view of Keir Starmer, compared to 64% with an unfavourable view. Among those who voted for Labour at the 2024 general election, most (55%) retain a positive opinion of the prime minister, although 39% have a negative opinion.

This compares to a nadir of just 18% public favourability for Starmer, in January of this year, at which point 75% of people had a negative view of him.

Starmer had been at his most popular as prime minister in the weeks following the 2024 general election, although even then he just missed out on achieving a net positive favourability score – the number of people with a positive view of him matched the number with a negative view, at 44% apiece.

How well do Britons think Keir Starmer did as prime minister?

With just a few days of his tenure left, our final assessment finds that only 16% deem Starmer’s time in power as good or great, while the number who say it has been average stands at 29%. Instead, half (51%) think he has been poor or terrible at Number 10.

This compares to 23% who expected Starmer to be good or great when asked in early June 2024, shortly before his landslide election victory. There is little difference in the number saying ‘average’ (30% in June), whereas Starmer’s latest ‘poor’ and ‘terrible’ figures represent a 20pt increase from 31% just prior to the general election.

Among Labour voters, 35% say Starmer has done well, much reduced from the 54% who anticipated a good or great performance in 2024. Instead, 43% consider him to have been an average prime minister, while 29% think he has been poor or terrible – only 5% of those who intended to vote Labour had anticipated that Starmer would do badly prior to the general election.

It should be noted that Andy Burnham comes to office with ratings that are not much better than Starmer achieved in June 2024. Only 21% think he will be good or great as prime minister, while 20% expect him to be average. A third (33%) say he will be poor or terrible – the main difference with Starmer being fewer people answering “average” and more answering “don’t know”.

What do Britons think is the best thing Keir Starmer did as prime minister?

When we asked the public to tell us, in their own words, what they think the best moment of Starmer’s premiership was, the most common answers relate to international affairs.

As is often the case with open questions, the answers are highly dispersed and even the top category is quite small, but 6% of Britons cite his refusal to join the US-Israel war on Iran as the best thing he has done, alongside 5% who cited his foreign policy and diplomacy more generally. Another 2% mentioned his handling of Donald Trump more specifically, and 1% brought up his support for Ukraine.

Among Labour voters themselves, these figures increase to 10% for his refusal of the call to arms on Iran, and 8% for his foreign policy more generally (as well as 4% for handling Trump and 3% on Ukraine).

Domestically, the public brought up improvements to the NHS, workers’ rights, and renters’ rights, all on 2% apiece, with a further smattering of achievements raised by 1%, including for rail nationalisation and the under-16 social media ban.

However, 43% of Britons – and 38% of 2024 Labour voters – answer “don’t know” when asked for Starmer’s best work, and a further 25% of the general public say either that they can’t think of anything good that he did, or that the highlight of his premiership has been standing down.

What do Britons think is the worst thing Keir Starmer did as prime minister?

When it comes to the worst thing that Starmer has done as prime minister, we again see diffuse responses. Topping the list is the winter fuel payment fiasco, at 6%, alongside the same number citing Starmer’s reputation for U-turning (more on which below), and an identical proportion who just say “everything”.

Among Labour voters, winter fuel payments and general indecision were cited by 8% apiece, with an additional 8% criticising the prime minister for his stance on the Gaza conflict.

Other criticisms that stand out among Labour voters (within the context of the small numbers involved) include the Peter Mandelson scandal (4%), and Starmer’s failure to communicate the government’s message and success properly, which some supporters attribute to his downfall.

What do Britons think of Keir Starmer himself?

Across five key personal characteristics that YouGov tracks, most Britons take a negative view in each of them.

Starmer performs most badly when it comes to decisiveness, with 74% of the public branding him ‘indecisive’ in the most recent wave of this tracker in late May.

Two thirds (67%) consider Starmer to be ‘weak’, while similar proportions describe him as ‘untrustworthy’, ‘incompetent’, and ‘dislikeable’ (59-60%).

Competence had previously been a key trait for Starmer. While he was underwater on the other four attributes long before he became prime minister, the public had been divided or even slightly positive in terms of his competence until autumn 2024 – following the winter fuel allowance row.

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For a more detailed look at what Britons have to say about Keir Starmer, see our qualitative analysis What Britons think of Keir Starmer, in their own words.

See full results here and here

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