Four in ten members would back Andy Burnham in a potential leadership election – exclusive poll

Over 40 percent of Labour members said they would back Andy Burnham in a potential leadership contest, were Keir Starmer to stand down as party leader, exclusive polling for LabourList reveals.

While there are significant hurdles to jump, not least that there is currently no vacancy, polling conducted by Survation suggests that, were Burnham to find a way to run, he would receive 43% of first preference votes.

The poll puts Health Secretary Wes Streeting second on nine percent, followed by former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner on seven percent.

The poll, conducted by Survation, also found that Burnham was ranked as a top three choice for leader by almost two-thirds of members polled (62%).

When asked to pick a current member of the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP), party members were more split, with 13% backing Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting respectively as their first choice, followed by former party leader Ed Miliband on nine percent, and Clive Lewis on eight percent.

Rayner was ranked as a first, second or third choice for Labour leader among the PLP by around a third of members (32%).

It comes as Andy Burnham hit out at the leadership again at the first day of Labour Party conference in Liverpool, calling for a “debate around direction” of the party.

READ MORE: Labour Party Conference 2025: Full LabourList events programme, revealed

Editor of LabourList Emma Burnell said: “If Andy can find a route in, and if there were to be an election, it’s his to win. But those are two big ifs.

“Without him in the race, the picture is a lot less clear. What this data shows is that there isn’t a clear ‘stop Burnham’ candidate – and if there were, it would probably be Angela Rayner – not the candidate you would expect those from Labour’s moderate factions to back.”

Survation surveyed 1,254 readers of LabourList, the leading dedicated newsletter and news and comment website for Labour supporters, who also said they were Labour Party members between September 23 and 25.

Data was weighted to the profile of party members by age, sex, region and 2020 Labour leadership vote, targets for which were derived from the British Election Study and the results of the 2020 leadership election.

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