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Greens overtake Labour in YouGov national VI

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YouGov's Westminster voting intention poll on 19-20 April fieldwork showed Reform on 27%, the Greens on 17% and Labour on 16%: the first national poll in which the Greens have outright led Labour, with Reform recording its largest-ever national lead.

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Key takeaway

The Greens lead Labour nationally for the first time; Reform's lead is the largest it has recorded.

YouGov's Westminster voting intention poll on 19-20 April fieldwork put Reform UK on 27%, the Green Party on 17%, the Conservatives on 17%, Labour on 16%, the Liberal Democrats on 14%, and Restore Britain on 3% ¹. The sample size was 2,472. It is the first national Westminster poll in which The Greens lead Labour outright, and Reform's largest-ever national polling lead. Labour finishes fifth on the central estimate.

The Greens' rise tracks the same urban-Labour decay registered by the Salford Barton and Winton by-election the same week, where the party finished third on 18.7%. Reform's 27% sits inside the polling band that has held since February . The novelty in the sample is the Labour floor, which has now broken below The Greens. Whether the result is a single-poll outlier or a sustained reordering of the centre-left vote is the question every party manager will be reading the next YouGov for. The local elections on 7 May supply the first ballot test.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

Westminster voting intention polls ask a sample of people which party they would vote for in a UK general election. YouGov's poll from 19-20 April 2026 , the most recent before the 7 May local elections , showed the Green Party (17%) ahead of Labour (16%) for the first time in any national poll. Reform UK led on 27%. The Conservatives tied the Greens at 17%. Labour finished fifth on 16%, behind four other parties. In the UK's Westminster voting system (first-past-the-post), a party's national vote share does not directly determine how many MPs it wins. Labour's vote is geographically concentrated in cities, meaning it wins more seats per percentage point than the Greens. The Greens won four Westminster seats in the 2024 general election with fewer total votes than this poll suggests they now hold nationally. The party's growth under Zack Polanski, who took over as leader in September 2025, has been driven by anti-government voters, particularly under-40s in urban areas, who are deserting Labour over Gaza, housing, and cost of living.

What could happen next?

Consequence
Labour now faces three-front vote loss: Reform on its right flank in traditional northern seats, Greens on its left in urban seats, and Your Party targeting Muslim-majority wards.

Sources:YouGov

Mentions:YouGov →Green Party →Reform UK →Restore Britain →Gaza →Liberal Democrats →Westminster →Zack Polanski →

First Reported In

Update #5 · 11 Days to Go: Six-of-six, RPA dies, Welsh lead flips

YouGov· 26 Apr 2026

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Different Perspectives

Green Party

Zack Polanski's campaign delivered the Hackney and Lewisham mayoralties and both councils, plus 543 English council seats, establishing the first Green governing base in outer London. The 153-seat MRP undershoot was attributed to FPTP tactical dynamics in marginal wards rather than a polling error in vote share.

UK Labour Government

Keir Starmer's government faces the immediate test of whether to intervene in Lancashire's withdrawal from the UK refugee resettlement scheme and the longer question of how to respond if the SNP tables a Section 30 vote. MHCLG's posture on Reform-controlled councils sets the template for the next four years of divided local government.

Scottish National Party (SNP)

John Swinney committed to a Section 30 vote on the first Holyrood sitting day post-appointment and a draft referendum bill within 100 days, reframing the 58-seat result as a working mandate despite missing his own 65-seat trigger. Westminster's pre-stated refusal of a Section 30 order means the constitutional confrontation is now a matter of timing.

Plaid Cymru

Rhun ap Iorwerth confirmed on 8 May that Plaid would attempt to govern Wales as a minority, ruling out immediate coalition talks and naming budget priorities as the test of cross-party support. The 43-seat result leaves Plaid six seats short of the 49-seat majority threshold.

Reform UK

Nigel Farage claimed 7 May as a historic breakthrough, pointing to 1,448 new councillors and 14 councils won from a near-zero base. The internal reckoning is that transition teams built for 22 councils must now govern 14, and three of those 14 produced immediate governance disputes.

Wales Governance Centre

The Centre framed Wales's mid-campaign Green-to-Plaid consolidation as 'consolidation, not conversion' in April, meaning voters did not migrate ideologically but regrouped tactically inside the same bloc because closed-list PR made it arithmetically rational. The final MRP result confirms that framing.