Farage least popular party leader in Wales, new poll finds
Nation.Cymru staff
Two-thirds of Welsh adults have an unfavourable opinion of Nigel Farage, making him the least popular party leader included in a new YouGov poll.
Just 23% view the Reform UK leader favourably, compared with 66% who view him unfavourably, giving him a net favourability score of minus 43.
The findings come five months after Reform became the largest opposition party in the Senedd following May’s election.
Despite the negative assessment of its UK leader, 51% of respondents regard Reform as one of Wales’s “main parties”, while 35% do not.
The survey measures attitudes towards politicians and parties rather than voting intention, so the findings do not establish whether Reform’s electoral support has changed.
Prime Minister Andy Burnham received the strongest personal rating among the politicians surveyed, with 49% viewing him favourably and 35% unfavourably. His net score of plus 14 puts him ahead of First Minister Rhun ap Iorwerth.
Opinion on the Plaid Cymru leader is almost evenly divided: 33% have a favourable view and 32% an unfavourable one, while 35% do not know.
Other UK party leaders also received negative net ratings, although none fared as poorly as Mr Farage.
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch was viewed favourably by 28% and unfavourably by 50%, giving her a net score of minus 22.
Green leader Zack Polanski scored minus 26, with 21% holding a positive view and 47% a negative one. Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey’s rating was minus six, with 27% favourable and 33% unfavourable.
Among Welsh party leaders, the poll found considerable uncertainty. Apart from Mr ap Iorwerth, at least 68% of respondents answered “don’t know” when asked for their opinion of each Senedd party leader. None received a favourable rating above 10%.
The findings also show how the public views the parties’ standing following May’s election, which brought Plaid Cymru to power for the first time and reduced Labour to the third-largest Senedd group.
Plaid was the most widely recognised as a “main party” in Wales, with 78% placing it in that category, followed by Labour on 67% and Reform on 51%.
Only 31% considered the Conservatives a main party, while 56% said they were not. Large majorities also placed the Greens and Liberal Democrats outside that category.
Health and the economy ranked above immigration among the public’s concerns. Asked to select up to three of the most important issues facing Wales, 48% chose health, 44% the economy and 33% immigration and asylum.
Housing was selected by 24% and education by 20%.
YouGov surveyed 1,039 adults aged 16 and over living in Wales between September 28 and October 5. The findings were published on October 15.
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While it is heartening to see these poll results, we still unfortunately are stuck with these clowns in the senedd for a few more years and they are only more likely to be even more disruptive and will be considering defecting to restore because Lowe is the super rich multi millionaire racist bigot waiting for them.
Like a fart in a spacesuit.
It’s cheering to see that Wales is not taking to Badenoch’s aggression and nastiness. Hope it’s not just this poll. The right-wing fan sheets have to have someone to adulate, but I’ve been struck by how many commentators in the less partisan media are now solemnly discussing how well she’s doing and failing to mark her toxicity. And they all seem to have forgotten already that she’d have dragged us instantly into full support for Trump and Netanyahu’s Iran war. She asked the other week “Who cares if I’m nasty?”. Well, I care about public discourse becoming more and more… Read more »
We can thank Dulwich College for giving us Farage and exposing that a quarter of Wales’ population have serious defects in their character…
Man who does overt racism and taking bungs from foreign powers starting to get found out? Sweet. BadEnoch is a fag paper away from reform as well.
Has anyone tried blaming the news media yet? After all, it would be an extreme position to hold Reform democratically accountable like any other party. They are a special case, and therefore perpetually exempt from scrutiny…..
He will have articles ready to go after Sundays ITV program on the racists and bigots he seems to attract to his racist and bigot party.
I have to admit Wibblefest ’26 is a joy to witness
This has to go into the ‘Thick as pig muck’ bucket. This name was not on my radar and it states ‘criminal offence’. Hate crimes, incitement to violence & incitement to hatred are all criminal offences and even if an individual is not personally responsible for such offences, failing to inform the police in the knowledge of such crimes being committed amounts to complicity in the crime. The difficulty here is that millions of us have already witnessed these hate crimes but my God, if all of us called the police, the system would crash. So, as such, i would… Read more »
Sweet. Dan Wootton on side as well.
Reform can revive its fortunes though. Its press man in London George Pykov runs that Facebook site “Senedd Waste”. He could get info on on the sums of overtime claimed in Laura Jones’ MS office with a FOI request, and then investigate whether her relationship with those claiming the overtime is purely professional. A real scandal might be found. What does his boss in Reform HQ Ed Sumner think?
Or milage.
Here is what my old employ did. They would check the milage claim, use a map, and people were caught out. Why did you take that route that added 60 miles to a 25 mile journey sort of check.
Are Senedd milage claims think of a number and scouts honour or actual places listed for the journeys and reasons given. Any in government office should be detailed.
I’m sure the tax free five million will compensate.
Why poll 16 year olds. Even so immigration and asylum was one of the top three concerns after HEALTH and the economy. As dire as education is it did not make the top 3.
16 year olds can vote in Senedd and local elections.
Although it is good to see that Wales is not falling for Nigel Farage’s far-right bilge, I am not sure why Rhun ap Iorwerth is second to Andy Burnham given that this poll is in a UK context rather than a Welsh one?
We forget also that Plaid Cymru’s Rhun ap Iorwerth was recently elected by the Welsh public as first minister of Wales , whereas the monarch of Manchester Andy Burnham was crowned prime minister, uncontested I might add, by only 379 Labour MPs.