Labour is back at the edge of a majority, and the race for second place has reset
Labour's lead is the widest YouGov has measured since it restarted its tracker. The Conservatives' autumn climb has stalled, Reform is at its joint lowest, and the order behind Labour now decides dozens of seats.
Polling Forecast
3 min read
data as of 11 November Written in house from our poll data and our forecast.
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A week ago the story of British polling was the Conservative recovery. YouGov had them two points behind Labour, their best score in its tracker since January 2025, and the talk was of a two-horse race. This week that story has gone into reverse.
YouGov's poll for The Times and Sky News, taken on 8-9 November, has Labour on 27%, the Conservatives 21, Reform UK 20, the Liberal Democrats 12 and the Greens 10. That is a six-point Labour lead, the largest YouGov has recorded since its tracker restarted, and the Conservatives are down three points in a week (YouGov). Opinium, taken on 4-6 November, tells the same story from a different angle: Labour 28, Reform 21, the Conservatives 20, the Greens 11 and the Lib Dems 10 (Opinium).
On our numbers Labour would win 324 seats, two short of a majority. A hung parliament still comes up in 54% of our simulations, but Labour's majority is now a coin toss rather than a long shot.
Why the order behind Labour matters so much
Look at the gap between second and fourth. In YouGov it is two points; in Opinium it is one. The Conservatives and Reform are fighting over largely the same voters in the same seats, and when they are level, neither wins many of them.
That is where Labour's seats come from. Labour is not winning by piling up votes; at 27-28% it is on a share that would have lost elections in most of the last fifty years. It is winning because the right is split almost exactly in half, and in hundreds of English seats Labour on 30% beats a Conservative on 26% and a Reform candidate on 25%.
The flip side is how quickly it could change. If either the Conservatives or Reform pulled clear of the other by five or six points, it would start winning those three-way seats back, and Labour's 324 would fall fast. The Conservatives' climb in October was the first sign of that happening. This week's polls say it has stopped, at least for now.
The prime minister is the asset
Andy Burnham is the only major party leader with a positive rating. Opinium has him at +5. Kemi Badenoch is on -1, Ed Davey -5, Nigel Farage -27 and the Green leader Zack Polanski -30. Asked to choose a prime minister, voters pick Burnham over Badenoch by 41% to 22% and over Farage by 47% to 22%.
He is also under pressure to show what he is for. On Wednesday he told the Commons that his ten-year plan for Britain will be published before Parliament rises for Christmas, after suggesting last week it might slip into the new year. Badenoch called the government "adrift" and the country "in limbo", attacked what she called the "do-nothing Budget", and asked why the plan needed management consultants to write it (Newark Advertiser).
That is the Conservatives' line for the winter: a likeable prime minister with no plan. It may work. But a party that has fallen three points in a week while making it is not yet the one with momentum.
What to watch
The next three YouGov polls. One poll with the Conservatives at 21 could be noise. Three would mean October's recovery was a Budget bounce that has faded.
Reform at 20. It is Reform's joint lowest in YouGov's tracker. Much below that, it starts losing the seats it still leads on our map.
The plan. Burnham has now promised it before Christmas. A plan that lands well could carry Labour over 326 on our numbers. One that disappoints hands Badenoch her argument.
Polling Forecast reads every poll in ten countries, corrects for how pollsters have missed before, and turns them into seats. Our forecasts, the polls and our methods are free to explore.
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