Israel-Palestine: New poll shows what councillors really think

The national media, including LabourList, have reported a lot in recent weeks on two dozen councillors quitting and several hundred writing letters pushing for a ceasefire. Today, the leaders of Burnley and Pendle councils’ calls for Keir Starmer to quit are getting significant attention.

As a former local government reporter, I think it’s generally welcome that councillors’ views get more airtime in the national conversation, but the focus on a fraction of Labour’s thousands of councillors begs the question – what do the rest of them actually think?

Savanta have managed to gather 618 councillors’ views this week. It’s still under a tenth of the reported 6,427 nationwide. so treat with caution. But it’s a start. Alarmingly, some 17% say they’ve considered resigning over the issue. Revealingly though, as Savanta’s Chris Hopkins notes, there are “fairly equal proportions” both satisfied (37%)  and dissatisfied (43%) with the leadership’s position, and who say they “understand” (50%) or “don’t understand” (43%) why Labour doesn’t back a ceasefire.

The figures also show 88% are “satisfied” with Labour’s prospects of winning the general election, and most are happy with how Labour holds the government to account too. More than half are happy with the leadership’s engagement with local government, though a quarter are not.

I had a drill down into the small print of the data this morning. Interestingly – though do note the smaller sample affects its reliability –  female councillors polled were less satisfied with Labour’s election prospects, council engagement, Brexit stance and indeed Israel-Palestine stance (46% dissatisfied to 39% for men). I found the 53 Midlands councillors polled were also most dissatisfied over Israel-Palestine (48% vs 30% satisfied); so too were the 31 identifying as Asian (67% dissatisfied vs 10% satisfied) among those highlighting their ethnicity.

Also notably, buried in the data is the fact that 134 newer councillors first elected since 2019 were most unhappy, with half dissatisfied versus around a third of those elected before 2009. Councillors who joined the party most recently, since 2010, were also most unhappy. Meanwhile those who said they voted in Starmer for leader were the only group more positive than negative on his handling of the conflict, with 50.5% backing him and only 27% unhappy. That compares to 84% of Rebecca Long-Bailey voters and 44% of Lisa Nandy voters.

Light my fire, Keir

Keir Starmer will use a speech today at the North East Chamber of Commerce to demand a King’s Speech that will “relight the fire of renewal”, after the Bank of England downgraded growth forecasts yesterday.

If he were in charge, Labour would “turbocharge” the economy, he’ll say, highlighting previously announced plans from new technical excellence colleges to investing in battery gigafactories, cleen steel plans, incentives for green UK investment  and planning reform to accelerate infrastructure construction. Let’s see if all the media questions focus on rifts over the Middle East, or if Starmer’s wider plans get a look in.

In other Labour news…

MIND THE POLLS: Starmer’s net approval rating is down 12 percentage points in a week. Deltapoll’s Matthew Price notes Labour can take some solace in 2019 Labour voters’ approval holding up, but the even more significant slump among 2019 Tory voters will unnerve senior figures.

MCLIBEL: Suspended Labour MP Andy McDonald has said he is taking legal action against a Tory MP who claimed he had been “seeking to justify the murderous actions of Hamas”. The MP and the Conservatives were not immediately available for comment, and The Guardian reported that the MP could not do so due to the legal action (The Guardian).

POWER IN AI: Shadow Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology Peter Kyle has said he believes artificial intelligence would have saved his mother from dying of lung cancer (The Telegraph).  

LABOUR FACES PROTEST: Labour politicians and supporters at a fundraising dinner in Newcastle faced protests outside by activists demanding a ceasefire (Chronicle Live).

WILKO: Wilko bosses must be hauled before parliament’s business and trade select committee to give evidence over the firm’s collapse, Labour affiliate GMB has said, writing to new Labour chair Liam Byrne.

This is an online version of LabourList’s daily newsletter, which hits the inboxes of  tens of thousands of Labour members, MPs, councillors, staff and others interested in reading the most comprehensive, independent briefing in town on Labour news, analysis and debate.