All posts tagged: poll

Far-right AfD tops German poll for first time – just weeks after Friedrich Merz’s election win

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[ad_1] The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) has topped a national poll for the first time, prompting the popular Bild newspaper to carry the headline: “AfD breaks the magic barrier”. The poll put the AfD on 26% and the Christian democratic CDU/CSU on 25%. This is just one opinion poll, but since February’s early federal election, the direction of travel has been clear. Governments sometimes become unpopular mid-term, but Germany isn’t mid-term. The federal election was just two months ago, and the new government hasn’t yet been formed (this routinely takes months in Germany). Nor has CDU leader Friedrich Merz become chancellor; the date pencilled in for that is May 6. Democracy in decline? The risk and rise of authoritarianism Democracy is under pressure around the world in 2025. But is this part of a larger historical cycle or does it signal a deeper, more fundamental shift? Join us for a free event in central London on May 8 to discuss these important questions. Come for a panel discussion and stay for food, drinks and …

Northern Ireland poll reveals most parents want less church influence and a more inclusive approach to religion in schools

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[ad_1] A new poll commissioned by Northern Ireland Humanists has revealed that most adults aged 18-54 – those most likely to have children currently in school – strongly support changing how religion is taught and practised in Northern Ireland’s classrooms. The poll was carried out by LucidTalk and explored three key issues: compulsory collective worship, Religious Education, and church involvement in school governance. The findings suggest that people across the board are unhappy with the dominant role Christianity still plays in schools. 72% didn’t know of the legal requirement for schools to hold daily Christian worship. 53% think ‘the requirement to provide a daily act of collective worship in schools should not be compulsory’,  while just 34% think it should remain compulsory. Northern Ireland Humanists believes these findings show legislation is out of step with modern families, many of whom hold diverse religious or non-religious beliefs. Northern Ireland Humanists want inclusive assemblies for all instead, allowing pupils to gather without a requirement to participate in religious practices. The poll also asked what the focus of …

Just 6% of teachers ‘positive’ about Ofsted proposals, shows poll

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[ad_1] More from this theme Recent articles Just six per cent of teachers feel positively about the proposed reforms Ofsted has unveiled this week, a poll has revealed. The education watchdog has launched a 12-week consultation on its proposals – which are aimed at raising standards and relieving pressure on teachers and heads – and include introducing new ‘report cards’. But in a poll of more than 11,000 teachers on Wednesday,  by daily survey app Teacher Tapp, zero per cent of respondents said they were ‘very positive’ about Ofsted’s plans. Just six per cent said they were ‘somewhat positive’. Meanwhile, more than one-third expressed reservations about the proposals, with 20 per cent saying they felt ‘somewhat negative’ and 16 per cent ‘very negative’. One-third said they had not seen the new plans, which were unveiled by Ofsted on Monday. The proposed ‘report cards’ would be used to assess schools and convey their performance to parents. Instead of single-word judgments, Ofsted proposes to rate schools across up to 11 different areas. Every school would be judged …

Reform within touching distance of Labour as poll suggests ‘new era’ for British politics | Politics News

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[ad_1] Reform UK has grown in support to within one percentage point of Labour according to a new poll for Sky News by YouGov which suggests Britain has entered a new era of three-way party politics. Sir Keir Starmer looks set to spend the parliament locked in a fight with two right-wing parties after Labour support dropped sharply in the first YouGov poll since the general election. The poll shows the Tories have now been pushed into third place – two months after Kemi Badenoch was elected leader. The data collected over the weekend puts Labour on 26%, Reform UK on 25%, Conservatives on 22%, Liberal Democrats on 14% and Greens on 8%. This is a huge switch from the general election, when Labour was on 35%, Conservatives on 24%, Reform UK on 15%, Lib Dem on 13% and Greens on 7%. Politics latest: Chancellor will remain until next election, Downing Street says This is the first of YouGov’s weekly voting intention polls for Sky News, shared with The Times. It reflects a drop in …

Only one in five Britons want bishops in the Lords – new poll

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[ad_1] Only one in five Britons wants bishops to have automatic seats in the House of Lords while most the public want them removed, a new poll has shown. The YouGov poll has found that only 22% of respondents wanted to keep bishops in the House of Lords, while 52% wanted their removal. This public support follows on from recent attempts in Parliament to remove the bishops. Humanists UK has long campaigned to remove the bishops on the basis that it is unfair, unjustified, and unpopular with the public at large. The only two sovereign states to award clerics of the established religion votes in their legislatures are the UK and the Islamic Republic of Iran. Not only this but the bishops get unique privileges, above and beyond other peers. As a 2020 report from the All-Party Parliamentary Humanist Group highlighted, bishops get unique easy access to Government officials, if a bishop stands up to speak then the convention is that everyone else has to stop and sit down, and the bishops’ votes on new …

New poll shows every constituency backs assisted dying

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[ad_1] A new multi-level regression and post-stratification (MRP) poll of 7,000 British adults has shown that in every constituency bar one, most people support legalising assisted dying for the terminally ill and incurably suffering. Humanists UK commissioned the poll from Electoral Calculus, and is releasing it to coincide with Kim Leadbeater’s Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill Bill. Today it said that MPs should back the law, and that the public want that law to allow terminally ill people to access an assisted death even when they are not in the last six months of their life. The poll asked two questions: In the first question, respondents were asked if they agreed or disagreed that assisted dying should be made legal for ‘adults who are intolerably suffering from an incurable condition and who wish to end their lives’. 74% of the public supported legalisation for the terminal and incurable, compared to just 6% opposed. A second question describes the plight of someone who was suffering from advanced multiple sclerosis (MS) and has a clear and …

More people now prefer Sunak government to Starmer’s, poll finds

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[ad_1] More people now prefer Rishi Sunak’s government to Sir Keir Starmer’s administration, a poll has found. A survey by think tank More in Common shows the Labour Government is already less liked than the previous Tory one, despite taking power less than three months ago. The poll of 2,080 adults showed that 31 per cent preferred Mr Sunak’s government, while 29 per cent preferred the current one. It comes after a rocky start to Sir Keir’s time in Downing Street amid a series of rows over clothing donations by Lord Alli, a millionaire Labour peer, and cuts to winter fuel payments. The Prime Minister’s net approval rating with More in Common has now fallen to minus 27 per cent, down 38 points from when Labour took office. It is a stark contrast to the reception that Sir Tony Blair received at a similar point following his own landslide in 1997, when it was reported his net score was as high as 93 per cent. About one in five voters (22 per cent) now think …

Public Will Lose Patience With Labour Blaming The Tories After A Year In Power, New Poll Suggests

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[ad_1] 3 min read20 September The public will lose patience with Labour blaming the Conservatives for the state of the country after the party has been in power for a year, a new poll suggests. A Savanta survey conducted in the run-up to Labour Party conference in Liverpool this weekend, shared exclusively with PoliticsHome, indicates voters are currently willing to tolerate the new Labour Government claim that the problems they are dealing with are the fault of previous Tory governments. Forty eight per cent of respondents said it was acceptable for the Keir Starmer administration to ‘blame the previous government for the state of the country’ after being in office ‘for a few months’, while 44 per cent told the pollster it was unacceptable. That balance of opinion shifted, however, when the scenario was changed to Labour having been in power for twelve months. Exactly half of people (50 per cent) said it would be unacceptable for the Government to blame the Tories for the state of the UK at that point, while 42 said it would be acceptable. Since …

Poll: 67% support integrated education in Northern Ireland

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[ad_1] More than two thirds of people in Northern Ireland agree that integrated education should be the main model for education, a poll has revealed. Sixty-seven per cent of respondents agree integrated schools, which intentionally educate children from Catholic, Protestant and other backgrounds together, should become the norm in NI, the poll found. Over 90% of pupils in NI attend schools which are effectively segregated along Protestant and Catholic religious lines. The vast majority of schools have very few pupils from the ‘other’ community, with 30% having no representatives of the ‘other’ community at all. The polling also found 63% of parents would support their child’s schools becoming an integrated school. A majority (70%) would support all schools, regardless of management type, aiming to have a religious and cultural mix of pupils, teachers and governors. The poll, which received over 2,300 responses, was held by independent polling company LucidTalk on behalf of the Integrated Education Fund (IEF). Despite this widespread support for integrated schools, and recent legislation which requires the NI executive to support them, …

Tories fall to new low in latest poll as Reform closes gap to three points

Tories fall to new low in latest poll as Reform closes gap to three points

Published by Sam

[ad_1] The Conservatives have dropped to a new polling low, with Reform UK closing the gap to just three points. Having already hit a five-year low last week with the pollster Savanta, the share of people planning to vote for the Conservative Party has slumped by a further two points amid warnings of a “collapse” in support. The exclusive poll for The Telegraph showed Labour on 42 per cent (up two points), the Tories on 19 per cent and Reform on 16 per cent (up two). It is the third poll in a row in which Reform has achieved its highest share in a Savanta poll since the party’s official creation in January 2021. The Liberal Democrats were on 9 per cent (down two points) with the Green Party on 5 per cent (down one) and the Scottish National Party on 3 per cent (no change). Savanta interviewed 2,103 UK adults aged 18 and over between June 19 and 21. Emma Levin, Savanta’s associate director, said: “Our research suggests that we could be watching the …