Ukraine: casting a long shadow

By Richard North - March 7, 2025

Less than three weeks ago, I was writing about Starmer’s attempt to insert himself into the Ukraine debate that was then emerging, suggesting that the prime minister might be seeking to engineer a variation of the “Falklands effect”, which served Thatcher so well in the 1983 general election.

Since then, he has briefly taken centre-stage, hosting the “international leaders’ summit conference” last week, in an attempt to unite supporting nations behind Zelensky with the objective of putting Ukraine “in the strongest possible position now so that they can negotiate from a position of strength”.

If at least some of Starmer’s intention was to improve his own personal position, his frenetic activity over the past few weeks seems to be succeeding – in part. From being the most-hated prime minister since the beginning of time, the latest YouGov favourability survey is showing an improvement in his standing.

According to this latest survey, the number of Britons with a favourable view of the prime minister has increased in the last two-and-a-half weeks from 26 percent in mid-February to 31 percent, while the proportion with an unfavourable view of the Labour leader has fallen from 66 to 59 percent. This sees his net favourability score rise to -28 from its last-recorded -40, the highest level for six months.

The YouGov press release also says that Starmer’s ratings have improved among voters from all four of the highest polling parties, which includes Farage’s Reform party.

By contrast, says the release, Farage’s numbers have worsened, with a quarter of Britons (26 percent) now having a positive view of him, down from 30 percent in mid-February. This is against two-thirds of the public (65 percent) seeing Farage in a negative light, up from 60%.

Farage’s latest net favourability score of -39, we are told, is 11 points lower than Starmer’s, a noticeable contrast from February’s ratings, which gave Farage a net advantage over Starmer of 10 points.

However, if Farage’s ranking is not particularly encouraging, Badenough’s is even worse Just one in five Britons (19 percent) see the leader of the opposition positively, although this is up two points on last month. By contrast though, almost half of Britons (49 percent) regard Badenough unfavourably, down two points. Thus, while Farage’s ratings have fallen, more Britons still have a favourable opinion of him than Conservative leader.

Looking further afield after the frenetic transatlantic activity, Donald Trump has not fared well. Eight in ten Britons (80 percent), says YouGov, now have an unfavourable view of him, up from 73 percent two weeks ago, while the number of Britons with a positive view of the US president has correspondingly fallen seven points to 15 percent.

Significantly, Trump’s favourability has taken such a knock that he is now unpopular overall among Reform UK voters. The proportion with a negative view of the president has risen fully 25 points to 53 percent since mid-February, while the number with a favourable view has fallen from a commanding 66 percent to just 45 percent now.

Ukrainian president Zelensky, though, has improved his ratings, with the proportion of Britons with a favourable view of him increasing from 64 to 71 percent. Again, the shift is largest among Reform UK voters, among whom he is now more popular than Donald Trump. The number with a favourable view of Zelensky has increased from 49 to 62 percent over the last fortnight, while those with an unfavourable view has declined from 37 to 27 percent.

In this context, I suppose we might adopt with variations a saying widely attributed to American author and social critic H L Mencken, declaring that “nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the British”. Here we have Trump – however crass and incoherent his statements might be – trying to save lives while Zelensky seems intent on prolonging an unwinnable war, at the cost of a mountain of dead.

The results are picked up by the Mail, which headlines: “Keir Starmer’s dire personal rating boosted by Ukraine leadership as Brits give damning verdict on Donald Trump – with even Reform voters turning against US president”.

An article by GB News makes similar observation, noting that Starmer’s posture on Ukraine has “played well for him domestically”, while Farage’s popularity has dipped “after he took a more equivocal stance on Trump and Ukraine”.

Farage, the broadcaster says, criticised Zelensky for his demeanour during the Oval Office encounter with Trump, stating that the Ukrainian president had “played it very badly” and accused him of “bowling in and showing no respect” for Trump”.

Farage, we are reminded, also suggested that the “chaotic” White House meeting might have proceeded more smoothly if Zelensky had adhered to traditional dress codes, remarking that Trump is “incredibly old-fashioned” about such matters.

The Reform leader hasn’t help himself by tearing into Vance over his claim that a Franco-British peacekeeping force would be just “20,000 troops from some random country that hasn’t fought a war in 30 or 40 years”, describing the vice president as “wrong, wrong, wrong” as he hailed Britain which “did our bit” alongside the US in Afghanistan.

Altogether, this hasn’t been a particularly good week for Farage, as he has also been critiqued by one of his MP “team”, Rupert Lowe, who has told the Mail, “I’m not going to be by Nigel’s side at the next election unless we have a proper plan to change the way we govern from top to bottom. We can’t raise the hopes of people who are so frustrated with the way we are governed and then flunk it”.

The Independent is quick to exploit this piece, running a headline: “Reform’s surge in polls grinds to a halt as Farage faces party rift over ‘messianic’ leadership style”.

Its sub-head tells us that “the latest Techne UK weekly tracker poll suggests that Reform UK has hit a ceiling in support as Nigel Farage’s leadership is questioned by fellow Reform MP Rupert Lowe – the man Elon Musk endorsed to be leader”.

Pete explores this development with a detailed analysis and the Spectator adds its ha’porth,

In a Johnny-come-lately comment, it remarks that “fair-minded commentators like Patrick O’Flynn, the former Ukip MEP, have argued that Reform’s impressive poll ratings now need to be matched with a credible policy offer too”.

If Reform continues its remarkable progress in the polls, the magazine says, it will come under increasing pressure to provide some serious solutions to the serious issues facing Britain. Or else Rupert Lowe – and others – will be off.

Some, of course, already are “off”, but what marks the superficiality of the magazine’s comment is that, as far back as 2003, I was telling Farage to his face that we needed policy development, only to experience the same fate that so many activists have suffered when they have dared to cross him.

Since then, enough people have warned Farage about the consequences of trying to build a party (or a movement) in a policy vacuum for it to evident that, if Farage had any intention of fostering a credible policy within Reform, he would have done so by now. He will not do so because he does not believe that policy statements are necessary.

What this tells us, in all likelihood, is that Lowe’s days are numbered as a Reform MP, and we may well be seeing the start of a more visible fragmentation of the Reform party, of a nature that plagued Ukip over the many decades of its existence and is being repeated in Reform.

Meanwhile, back in the “real” world – or what passes for it – we have Zelensky cosying up to the European Council (pictured) in a love-fest that can only serve to irritate Trump further.

Von der Leyen, however, seems to have got what she came for, with the popular Zelensky unwittingly (one assumes) aiding the cause of European political integration, without apparently being aware that he is being used.

If Farage (and Badenough, for that matter) were on top of their briefs, they would be able to make their own positive contributions to the debate, but in this high-octane political drama, they have both shown themselves to be slow to respond and derivative, thus handing the initiative to Starmer.

Never more, in my view, has there been a time when we needed an effective opposition yet, in and amongst the so many events that have dominated the news agenda of the past weeks, what we have seen is that neither of these two figure are capable of stepping up to the plate.

Things have gone quite over the forthcoming Runcorn and Helsby recall petition, but soon enough there will be a by-election in the constituency and, in the absence of an effective opposition challenge, we may see Stramer translate his improved favourability standing into electoral gain.

The Ukraine drama, therefore, is casting a long shadow with repercussions which, three years ago, no-one could possibly have predicted.