Over half of voters would choose Keir Starmer over Boris Johnson, new poll shows

The poll comes ahead of crucial local elections

More than half of voters would choose a Labour government led by Keir Starmer over a Tory government led by Boris Johnson, a major new poll has found. The 8,000-person survey was commissioned by former Conservative Deputy Chairman Lord Ashcroft, with 57 percent choosing Starmer over Johnson. Starmer was preferred by voters in nearly every area, including communicating, leading a team, formulating effective policies and judgment in a crisis. The results come after months of scandal within the Tory Party. In recent weeks, fines have been handed out to several members of the party, including the Prime Minister and Chancellor Rishi Sunak, and on Saturday, Tory MP Neil Parish resigned after admitting to watching porn twice in the House of Commons. Almost half of those asked (47 percent) said they believed the Prime Minister should resign for the partygate scandal, including nearly a third of those who switched to the Tories from Labour at the last election in 2019. https://twitter.com/LordAshcroft/status/1520513703132733441 But 30 percent said that although his actions were wrong they would like him to stay in charge, with 15 percent labelling the stories of parties in Downing Street during lockdown as "trivial." Meanwhile, 55 percent of respondents approved of the Tory leader's handling of the war in Ukraine, with just a quarter thinking he had done a bad job. The poll comes just days before a raft of local elections take place. On May 5, more than 4,350 seats will be contested in England on over 140 councils, with all of Scotland’s 32 councils and all 22 councils in Wales also holding elections. Local elections are often seen as an opportunity to capture the public mood on how a government is doing. Related links:

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