New Poll Suggests Nearly 70% Of MPs Believe Boris Johnson Is Performing Badly As Prime Minister
2 min read
A new snapshot poll of MPs shows a majority of nearly 70% of respondents say Boris Johnson is performing “badly” as Prime Minister.
The snapshot survey of 45 MPs revealed that seven in 10 (69%) would rate Johnson’s discharge of his duties as “very bad or bad” — twice the number (36%) who believe that Labour leader Keir Starmer is performing poorly.
MPs were found to have far greater confidence in chancellor Rishi Sunak, with nearly 50% of those questioned saying they believed he was doing a good job.
Only 23% thought that Sunak — who is widely seen as one of Johnson’s main rivals for the Tory leadership — was performing poorly in his role.
The polling, produced by political intelligence specialists Dods, also revealed that only 36% of MPs believe that the UK was prepared for a new strain of coronavirus to succeed the Omicron variant.
It comes as the Prime Minister faces questions over his position following reports several gatherings were held at Downing Street in 2020 despite coronavirus restrictions being in place.
There have been calls for Johnson to resign from both inside and outside his party, with senior backbencher David Davis telling the Tory leader “in the name of God, go” in the Commons last week.
The indicative research, which drew 45% of its responses from Conservative MPs, found that many members had doubts over the government’s performance on other policy areas including Brexit and COP26.
Only 36% of MPs said they believed COP26 was a success, while 11% responded that they were “confident” the world was on track to meet its flagship target of keeping global temperature rises under 1.5C.
In comparison, over half (56%) said they were not confident that the world was on track to hit this target, which is widely believed to be the only way to avery the worst possible outcomes of climate change.
Asked about the outcomes of Brexit, 52% of those polled said they believed that neither the UK nor the EU has benefited from the split so far, with 9% saying that the EU had benefited the most.
Fieldwork for the poll took place between December 2021 and January 2022.
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