With smaller parties on the rise, PM Starmer may need to watch his left flank

As a new poll exposes just how unpopular the Labour leader really is, the Lib Dems and Greens could be posed to make the argument for proportional representation, writes Andrew Grice

The Greens’ co-leaders Carla Denyer and Adrian Ramsay have launched the party’s manifesto (Getty Images)

Could this be the election when the smaller parties benefit from a public revolt against the two main ones? Unusually, the latest opinion polls show the Conservatives and Labour both losing support. In recent elections, the big two squeezed the smaller parties during the campaign – but this time it’s different.

In 2017, the Tories and Labour hoovered up 82 per cent of the votes between them. In 2019, they shared 78 per cent. But in the latest polls, their combined share averages just 64 per cent. The latest YouGov survey puts it at 56 per cent.

It’s partly the Farage effect. Since Nigel Farage returned to the front line, the Tories are down four points and Labour three, while his Reform UK is up five points, according to David Cowling, the BBC’s former head of political research.

But there’s a wider rebellion going on. The Liberal Democrats and Greens are also up slightly. The incipient revolt won’t stop Labour winning, and it will probably win big because of its huge lead over the Tories.

Yet the revolt should worry Keir Starmer. He might lack a moral mandate if he wins a huge number of seats on a historically low share of the vote.

For now, the view in Labour’s high command is that this would be a nice problem to have. We can hardly blame them after 14 years in the wilderness. They are nervously excited that Starmer – admittedly with a lot of help from the Tories – is on the brink of ending their impotence quicker than he or his party imagined when he took over after Labour’s worst election result since 1935.

But there seems to be little love for Starmer, who would surely not enjoy the honeymoon – or the benefit of the doubt – Tony Blair did in 1997. Remarkably for a party leader on course for victory, 49 per cent of people think Starmer would be a bad prime minister, according to YouGov. He would have a lot to prove, and quickly.

If support for the smaller parties continues to build before 4 July, it would fuel support for the introduction of proportional representation. I think Starmer might be less hostile to it than his most recent public statements suggest.

While running for the Labour leadership he said: “We’ve got to address the fact that millions of people vote in safe seats and they feel their voice doesn’t count ... We will never get full participation in our electoral system until we do that at every level.”

But last year his spokesperson said he had a “longstanding view against proportional representation”.

I suspect Starmer was keeping electoral reform up his sleeve in case he needed a concession to win Lib Dem support in a hung parliament. One Labour insider told me: “There is a feeling Keir took it off the table in case he needed to put it back on the table.”  He won’t need it now. But perhaps he will one day.

I know it’s hard to imagine a government that has won a huge majority under our archaic first-past-the-post system changing it. Politicians don’t give up power voluntarily. But might a people’s revolt eventually force their hand? One attraction for Labour: the Tories fear PR would lock them out of power permanently.

Today’s British social attitudes survey shows trust and confidence in politicians at a record low after Tory turmoil, scandals like Partygate and Leavers’ disillusionment about Brexit. Thanks, Boris. A record high 53 per cent want to change the Commons voting system “to allow smaller parties to get a fairer share of MPs,” including 60 per cent of Labour supporters.

Starmer knows he would have to rebuild trust as well as public services. Expect early post-election announcements on improving standards in life, including a new ethics commission, which would have the added bonus of not costing money.

But restoring trust also requires a more honest conversation with the voters.

Politicians say they want that discussion – but not until they have won power because holding it before an election could diminish their chances. Why would Labour throw the sinking Tories a lifeline by admitting it would need to raise taxes?

However, the two main parties’ conspiracy of silence about tax and spend could boost support for the smaller ones. A reminder of the threat came today when the Greens’ co-leaders Carla Denyer and Adrian Ramsay launched the party’s manifesto in England and Wales. It includes a lot of measures progressive voters wish Labour would go for, such as a wealth tax of 1 per cent on people with assets of £10m or more and 2 per cent for those with more than £1bn. People earning £50,000 would pay higher national insurance.

Although they will probably end up with only one or two MPs, I have a feeling the Greens might become a powerful focus of opposition to a Labour government. Starmer would need to watch his left flank.