Tory leadership candidates fail to inspire as new poll shows Starmer support holds firm

Exclusive: A week of coverage of the Tory leadership contest and more questions over free gifts have only made a small dent in Labour’s continued poll lead

The Tory leadership candidates have not enthused voters (Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire)

Keir Starmer’s lead in the polls has barely been dented after another week of criticism for the prime minister and his government over free gifts and blanket coverage of the Tory leadership contest.

The latest weekly Techne UK tracker poll has revealed that Labour’s share of the vote dropped just one point to 31 per cent while the Tories gained one to 23 per cent.

It suggests that the four Conservative leadership candidates hoping to replace Rishi Sunak, who made their pitches over four days in Birmingham, failed to inspire the wider public outside the confines of party activists.

The four Tory leadership candidates take the stage (Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire)

The event saw Robert Jenrick, Tom Tugendhat, Kemi Badenoch and James Cleverly do a series of fringes, Q&A sessions and make a final speech at the end.

Meanwhile, Nigel Farage’s Reform UK has held steady unchanged on 18 per cent, the Lib Dems remain on 13 per cent and the Greens repeat last week’s result of 7 per cent.

Techne UK chief executive Michela Morizzo said: “With the Conference season now complete, our latest tracker poll of Westminster voting intentions shows the Conservative Party continuing to grow slightly in national vote share.

“With the other main parties standing firm, the current trend shows that the attention is now focused on the two main parties. And, even if the Labour and Conservatives’ conferences overall barely inspired, we can also say that a glimpse of hope seems to be reserved to Conservatives, also because of the Conservative leadership election continuing.

“Let’s see what will happen in the coming weeks, but, in the meantime, Labour have to bear in mind that the public opinion is very attentive to what the Government delivers and that, as we always say, economy rules!”

One glimmer of hope for the Tories is that they have drawn level with Labour in a key voting category - pensioners. Labour had led in all age groups but now both parties get 17 per cent each of 65 and overs. This follows continued unease over Keir Starmer’s decision to cancel the winter fuel allowance for 10 million pensioners.

But in a week where Starmer has decided to pay back £6,000 of free gifts after negative press on freebies in a third attempt to close the issue down, the row does not yet seem to have hurt him in the polls.

However, only 32 per cent of voters say they trust the government to meet the priorities of the country compared to 42 per cent who do not trust them.