Under 20 per cent of Tory 2019 voters expect to benefit from Spring Budget – poll
Less than 20 per cent of Conservative 2019 voters expect to be better off thanks to the Spring Budget, a new poll has found.
The Helm/Deltapoll Monitor revealed just 18 per cent of those who backed the Tories at the 2019 general election think they will benefit from Chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s fiscal measures.
Analysis published alongside the findings warned: “Post-Budget polling has shown that overall voters supported most of the measures, or at least found them unobjectionable.
“But this survey shows a lack of confidence even among previous Tory voters in the likely effectiveness of Hunt’s economic measures.”
Researchers also revealed that a majority of 2019 Tory voters don’t plan to back the party at the next election, indicating the absence of a post-Budget bounce in the polls, and the lowest level recorded by Helm/Deltapoll.
49 per cent of those voters say they will back the party at the ballot box – which represents a five per cent decrease compared to polling of the group immediately after the Budget.
This is despite Hunt’s giveaway, cutting National Insurance (NI) by two per cent in a bid to appeal to voters via the pound in their pocket.
However, in one boost to Prime Minister Rishi SUnak, only 20 per cent of 2019 Conservative voters say they would prefer a Labour-led majority government after the next election.
Greg Cook, associate senior counsel at Helm Partners, said: “Those Tory MPs despairing about the lack of recovery in the polls need to accept that voters are simply not in the mood to give the government any credit and are taking every opportunity to express their discontent.
“But when these lost Tory voters actually have to choose a government their misgivings about Labour might make Sunak seem the best of a bad bunch, and much of the surge to Reform might melt away.
“It is a reasonable scenario, but it may well not materialise until the election campaign itself.”