The British electorate is seeing the rise of “Islamopopulism”, in which Muslim voters are abandoning their traditional political home of the Labour Party for left-wing alternatives and single-issue independents who cater to niche issues like Gaza, a think tank has found.
According to a report from Policy Exchange, Muslim support for the Labour Party has collapsed from a high of around 80 per cent under former leftist leader Jeremy Corbyn to just 33 per cent today under Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, while polling from JL Partners for the think tank warned that the party’s Islamic vote share could collapse even further in this week’s local elections in England.
For Muslim voters under the age of 25, support for Labour drops below 30 per cent.
The report, which surveyed over 1,000 UK Muslims last month, found that amid the rise of “Islamopopulism” which focuses heavily on issues involving the Middle East rather than Britain, there has been declining support for Starmer’s Labour Party, which has dropped precipitously following his refusal to brand Israel’s war in Gaza a “genocide”.
This has also coincided with surging support for the far-left Green Party under the revamped leadership of London Assembly Member Zack Polanski, who took over the party last year and has shifted its focus from environmentalism to multiculturalism in a bid to cater to the Muslim vote. Islamic voter support for the leftist party has surged from 18 per cent at the 2024 general election to 27 per cent today.
However, the true scale of the issue for Labour may not be fully demonstrated by party support levels, with the report finding that British Muslims are increasingly willing to vote tactically to “punish” the Labour Party to a greater extent than the Conservative or Nigel Farage’s Reform UK parties. According to the survey, 49 per cent of British Muslims would vote for the Greens tactically to prevent Labour from winning in their area, compared to 48 per cent for both Reform and the Tories.
Willingness to vote tactically to hurt Labour jumps even higher for single-issue pro-Gaza independent candidates, with 60 per cent saying they would back such a candidate to block a Labour candidate, compared to 57 per cent against a Tory or 55 per cent against a Reform candidate. Currently, there are only four pro-Gaza MPs in the House of Commons; however, Policy Exchange noted that many candidates were narrowly defeated at the last general election — often in tight races with Labour candidates — and thus could see their ranks swell in this week’s local elections and at the next general election.
One of the four MPs to win on a pro-Gaza ticket was former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, who has since gone on to found the far-left ‘Your Party’ alongside fellow socialist Zarah Sultana. Although currently mired in persistent infighting, the party could provide another avenue for further Muslim defections from Labour.
The report also demonstrated how out of step the Muslim population of Britain is with the rest of the country. According to the survey findings, while over one in four would back Reform UK party at a general election — the highest support of any national party — just one in 20 Muslims would consider voting for the Nigel Farage-led party.
Conversely, while only around one in ten of the general public would vote for the Greens, this jumps to over one in four among British Muslims. Similarly, although just one per cent of the voting public would back a pro-Gaza independent, 14 per cent of British Muslims said they would, rising to nearly one third among British Muslims aged 18 to 24.
This shift has already had a noticeable impact on British elections, with the recent by-election in Gorton and Denton — traditionally a Labour Party stronghold — falling to the Greens on the back of significant support from the local Muslim community, which makes up around a third of all voters in the constituency. However, the election win came with some controversy, with an independent election watchdog claiming to have witnessed widespread “family voting“, a practice in which typically older male relatives join female family members in the voting booth to ensure they vote the party line.
The simultaneous rise of single-issue pro-Gaza candidates has also led to concerns about increasing sectarianism in Britain and the potential for the democratic process to break down into various factions putting their niche issues above the national interest.
The lead author of the Policy Exchange report, Dr Rakib Ehsan, said per The Telegraph: “The fresh polling also reveals that there are fundamental differences between the wider general population and British Muslims living in parts of England where problems over integration persist.
“This is especially stark over the extent to which Israel-Gaza is prioritised as an issue when deciding how to vote in the forthcoming local elections.”
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