Liz Truss has slumped to the lowest-ever popularity rating of any British political leader following a catastrophic start to her premiership.
A survey by polling firm YouGov, conducted immediately after she fired Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng and abandoned key components of her economic strategy last Friday, shows that four out of five British adults (80 percent) view Truss unfavorably, while only 10 percent have a favorable view of her.
Her net favorability score of minus 70 percent is the lowest recorded by YouGov in two decades of polling, and constitutes a 14-point drop since last week.
She has only been in power for six weeks.
Truss’ favorability among her own Conservative voters is only slightly higher than among the public as a whole, with 71 percent having an unfavorable view of her as a party leader and 20 percent seeing her favorably.
Truss is polling 17 points lower than Boris Johnson’s worst-ever score of minus 53 percent, shortly before he was forced to quit in July. His net favorability score today (minus 36) is almost twice as high as Truss’ current rating.
Likewise, Truss’ defeated leadership rival Rishi Sunak is also much less unpopular than she is, with a net favorability rating of minus 18 percent.
Truss’ collapse in popularity has had a devastating impact on the Conservative Party’s own poll ratings. The latest poll-of-polls by Electoral Calculus, published Monday, predicts the Conservatives would not even be left as the official opposition if there were a general election today.
The forecast suggests that on current ratings the Scottish National Party (SNP) would secure four more Westminster seats than the Conservatives, despite only competing in Scotland. The Tories are predicted to get only 48 seats, down from 365 in the 2019 election.
The forecast predicts a landslide victory for the Labour Party, with an overwhelming majority of 507 seats.
The next U.K. general election is not expected until 2024.
