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UK Local Elections 2026
15JUL

Reform plateau breaks after five weeks

1 min read
13:32UTC

YouGov's five-week Reform plateau broke in mid-July, with the Conservatives and Labour tied at 19% and the Greens up to 15%.

PoliticsDeveloping
Key takeaway

YouGov's Reform plateau broke, leaving the Conservatives and Labour tied at 19%.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

For five weeks, opinion polls had barely moved: Reform UK sitting comfortably ahead of everyone else. That finally changed in YouGov's poll taken 12-13 July. Reform dropped slightly to 24%, while the Conservatives and Labour are now tied at 19% each, and the Greens jumped two points to 15%, their biggest single move of the whole parliament so far.

Deep Analysis
Root Causes

YouGov's own fieldwork notes flag the 12-13 July poll as its first conducted after Burnham's confirmation as Labour leader was locked in, rather than merely rumoured, the most likely proximate trigger for movement after five weeks of an unchanged Reform lead .

The two-point jump for the Greens, their fastest movement of the parliament, coincides with the same fieldwork window, suggesting some of the shift is undecided or soft Labour-considering voters moving to a clearer alternative rather than direct Reform-to-Green switching, though YouGov's topline does not publish internal transfer data.

First Reported In

Update #12 · The finance bill Reform outran is back

YouGov· 15 Jul 2026
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Different Perspectives
Local Government Association
Local Government Association
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Reform UK
Reform UK
Reform's £12m Harborne windfall from 2025 predates the 25 March retrospective crypto-donation ban, so the new law does not reach it; a live police probe into £500,000 of Cottrell donations continues, while the standards inquiry into Harborne's undeclared £5m gift is frozen since Farage vacated Clacton on 8 July.
Incoming Burnham government
Incoming Burnham government
Burnham secured 349 of the backing the NEC's 81-MP threshold required by 13 July, becoming Labour leader on 17 July and prime minister on 20 July without a members' ballot. He now inherits the LGR timetable the LGA wants him to adjust and a finance bill his own backbencher, Liam Byrne, is trying to harden further via amendment NC34.
Rupert Lowe / Restore Britain
Rupert Lowe / Restore Britain
Lowe called Farage's Clacton contest a 'Reform-sponsored media circus' and kept Restore Britain out of it, pledging instead to stand in the second by-election he expects the Harborne inquiry to force later this year. The boycott doubles as a signal that Restore Britain, not Reform, will contest the 'real' vote.
Kemi Badenoch / Conservative Party
Kemi Badenoch / Conservative Party
Badenoch dismissed Farage's Clacton contest as a 'fake by-election' and joined the boycott, but reserved the right to fight a genuine second contest if Greenberg's inquiry forces one. The Conservatives are betting their real fight comes in autumn, not July.
Rhun ap Iorwerth / Plaid Cymru
Rhun ap Iorwerth / Plaid Cymru
Ap Iorwerth defended a £145m NHS allocation at First Minister's Questions on 1 July, blaming a graduate-nurse shortfall on 2022 training decisions taken before his Plaid-led government took office in May. Answering for choices his government did not make gives his new administration its first real accountability test.