Big misalignment between Labour public investment plans and voter expectations

Only 2% of those planning to vote Labour at the general election believe that a Labour government would cut levels of public investment according to new research [1].

The polling was commissioned by the Invest in Britain campaign, a new initiative calling for a substantial uplift in UK public investment, and conducted by YouGov. It found that 72% of those currently supporting Labour believed the Party would raise public investment if elected.

However, new analysis from the Institute for Public Policy Research has found that, despite an additional £4.7bn of public investment earmarked for green investment, “a Starmer-led government would end its first term having cut investment more than the entire Conservative 2010-24 administration” [2].

This is because the Party has signed up to Conservative spending plans after the election, which have baked in steep cuts to the level of public investment in order to meet their fiscal rules [3].

Other key findings of YouGov research include:

• 70% of the public believe that UK public investment has been too low in recent decades. This rises to 84% among those currently supporting Labour.
• Among the general public 50% believe that Labour would increase public investment, only 12% think they would reduce it.
• The public are more than three times as likely to think that increasing government spending will be good for the economy than to think that cutting government spending will be good for the economy (50% compared to 15% respectively).

Tom Railton from the Invest in Britain campaign said:

“The UK has a serious under-investment problem, and this is one of the key reasons the economy has been under-performing so badly in recent years.

“The impacts are being deeply felt by people across the UK, with a clear sense that our public services are collapsing and “nothing works anymore”, and the overwhelming majority of those supporting Labour doing so in the belief that it means more investment, not less.

“Labour has made some positive noises about investment, but the plans they have set out still imply big public investment cuts which are not economically credible and not what their own voters want.”

ENDS

Notes to editors:

[1] All figures, unless otherwise stated, are from YouGov Plc.  Total sample size was 2,027 adults. Fieldwork was undertaken between 19th – 20th June 2024.  The survey was carried out online. The figures have been weighted and are representative of all GB adults (aged 18+).

[2] Dibb G and Jung C (2024) Rock bottom: Low investment in the UK economy, Institute for Public Policy Research, pp. 8-10, https://www.ippr.org/articles/rock-bottom

[3] Zaranko B (2024) Public investment: what you need to know, Institute for Fiscal Studies, https://ifs.org.uk/articles/public-investment-what-you-need-know