Labour tax backlash: half the public say Starmer and Reeves lied

On Monday 4 November, Rachel Reeves gave a ‘panicked’ speech in which she hinted she’s about to raise taxes. This proved controversial, because Labour pledged not to raise taxes in the 2024 election. It also made a mockery of their entire manifesto, of course, as well as making it impossible for many voters to ever trust them again.

All in all, then, not a very good speech.

And as you might imagine, this situation has gone down poorly with the public:

🚨 Latest Opinium @ObserverUK poll 🚨

Half the public believe Rachel Reeves planned a tax rise all along.

Only 1 in 5 think changing circumstances forced her hand.#Budget2025 pic.twitter.com/q6LHtRE5a2

— Opinium (@OpiniumResearch) November 8, 2025

Sneaky Labour

Opinium presented the following polling options:

• Labour always planned to raise taxes (50%).
• Labour are going to raise taxes because circumstances have changed (20%).
• Neither (11%).

To be fair to Labour, circumstances have changed. Specifically, Labour proved to be much less effective in government than they expected, and as such the financial situation is worse than they anticipated.

You can see why people aren’t buying Labour’s line, of course; just look at Reeves’ expression when she made her speech:

Rachel Reeves delivers big pitch-rolling speech for tax-rising budget later this month… after promising last year taxes wouldn’t have to go up again.

But chancellor says: “My job is to deal with the world as I find it, not the world as I might wish it to be”. pic.twitter.com/AOtC9cIOdG

— Pippa Crerar (@PippaCrerar) November 4, 2025

That’s the face you pull when you’ve got bodies under the patio and your neighbour just adopted a corpse-sniffing dog.

It gets worse too; regardless of why people think Reeves is raising taxes, a large majority think it’s the wrong thing to do:

🚨 Latest Opinium @ObserverUK poll 🚨

3 in 5 say raising income tax, NI or VAT would be the wrong decision for Reeves to make.

Just 1 in 5 (19%) think Rachel Reeves would be right to raise taxes against Labour’s manifesto pledge.#Budget2025 pic.twitter.com/QUO5p6DvPE

— Opinium (@OpiniumResearch) November 8, 2025

The problem Labour have is that no one understands what Starmer is aiming for; no one knows what it will look like when he gets there, and most people doubt he knows either.

To demonstrate what we mean, this is the sort of thing he’s posting:

This is the defining political choice of our time.

A politics that preys on the problems of working people or patriotic renewal, rooted in communities, building a better country.

I know whose side I’m on.

— Keir Starmer (@Keir_Starmer) September 26, 2025

We are a fair, tolerant and decent country.

But we are in the fight of our times.

We must choose patriotic national renewal over decline and toxic division every time.

— Keir Starmer (@Keir_Starmer) September 16, 2025

Nonsense.

Just absolute drivel.

Starmergeddon

Reform and the Tories are saying that Labour are a bunch of incompetent liars who have no idea what they’re doing; Labour, meanwhile, are coming out with shit like the above. It’s much easier to believe the former, because unlike Starmer’s tweets, his detractors’ arguments do at least make sense.

Zack Polanski and the Greens, meanwhile, are offering actual solutions to people’s problems:

Trevor Philips, “You don’t want a rise in income tax?”

Zack Polanski, “No, people are tired and exhausted”

“Their wages haven’t gone up, food prices are going up”

“How can you take from the hardest working people with extra tax, while allowing multimillionaires and… pic.twitter.com/yLTREXRqs4

— Farrukh (@implausibleblog) November 9, 2025

This is all feeding into polling like the following:

🚨 Latest Opinium @ObserverUK poll 🚨

Public trust in Labour leader’s economic management drops almost 10 points since March. Now…

🔻 Starmer net trust on economy: -41
🔻 Reeves: -48 (lowest of any major politician)

#Budget2025 pic.twitter.com/L3mqvik8BU

— Opinium (@OpiniumResearch) November 8, 2025

🚨 Latest Opinium @ObserverUK polling 🚨

For the 9th poll in a row, Keir Starmer has had a net approval rating of -40 or below.

This week he has dropped 4 points to -45. pic.twitter.com/nODoZsnnW5

— Opinium (@OpiniumResearch) October 25, 2025

🚨 Latest Opinium @ObserverUK polling 🚨

Reform maintains a 10-point lead, with both Reform and Labour dropping 2 points since a fortnight ago.

12% is the Green Party’s best performance this year. pic.twitter.com/e4vydkHDVz

— Opinium (@OpiniumResearch) October 25, 2025

Unlike Labour, the public do have a viable solution to the mess that Starmer and Reeves have created:

🚨 Latest Opinium @ObserverUK poll 🚨

Over half say Keir Starmer (56%) and Rachel Reeves (57%) should resign.

Even a third of 2024 Labour voters agree. #Budget2025 pic.twitter.com/0tjlPgShGQ

— Opinium (@OpiniumResearch) November 8, 2025

We don’t know where Starmer and Reeves go from here, but we hope that the answer is ‘away‘.

Featured image via Pexels