On behalf of The Sunday Telegraph, we at Redfield & Wilton Strategies asked British voters how they would vote in a General Election if the leaders of the Conservative and Labour Parties were, respectively, the various contenders for the Conservative Party leadership contest and Keir Starmer.

In each scenario, the Labour Party leads by a considerable margin, ranging from 15% if Boris Johnson was leader to 46% if Liz Truss, somehow, remained leader of the party. If Rishi Sunak became Leader of the Conservative Party, Labour would lead by 20%. For context, Labour was ahead by 12% in our polling on the day Boris Johnson resigned (7 July) and by 36% on the day before Liz Truss resigned. 

Altogether, the full results for each scenario are as follows:

Looking closely at those who voted for the Conservative Party in December 2019, 69% would vote Conservative again if Boris Johnson were to be leader again. 18% would vote Labour, while 4% would be undecided. Another 4% say they would not vote in this scenario.

By comparison, 60% of 2019 Conservative voters would vote Conservative if Rishi Sunak were to be Leader of the Conservative Party. 21% would vote for Labour under this scenario.

In head-to-head polling between the various leader contenders and Keir Starmer, Johnson manages to keep Starmer’s lead to single digits, with the Labour Party leader only 3% ahead of the former Prime Minister (42% to 39%). By comparison, Starmer is ahead of Rishi Sunak by 11% (44% to 33%) and Penny Mordaunt by 27% (49% to 22%).

When voters are offered a choice between Rishi Sunak and Boris Johnson on the question of who would be the better Prime Minister, Sunak leads with the general public by just 1%, 37% to 36%. Among 2019 Conservative voters, however, Johnson leads by 22% (55% to 33%).