Research has found that 34% of Brits approve of the Government’s decision to open the UK’s first coal mine for 30 years.
The poll by Omnisis also found that 26% disapproved of the proposal to open the mine in Cumbria which would be used to dig up coking coal for steel production in the UK and across the world.
As the cost of living crisis and winter bites Britain, Omnisis also asked people whether ‘warm banks’ should be necessary in the UK with 70% saying they should not be necessary versus 11% agreeing they should be.
On food banks, 67% said they should not be necessary in a developed country compared to 18% who said they should.
Meanwhile, the Tories enjoyed a five-point bump to close Labour’s lead at the top of the voter intention tracker to 18 points this week. Labour currently sits on 48% of the vote with the Conservatives on 30% and Liberal Democrats third on 9%.
Our other weekly trackers showed:
- Rishi Sunak picked up four points to take his approval rating up to 38%
- The Prime Minister also picked up four points (34%) to lead Sir Keir Starmer (32%) as the best person to lead the country
- There was little movement in our “re-join the EU” tracker, with a one-point gain for the “stay out” group (34%) compared to a one-point drop for the Rejoin group who still lead on 44%
The latest Omnisis poll, conducted on 8th December 2022, questioned 1,294 people and is weighted to a nationally representative population.
Brian Cooper, Managing Director of Omnisis, said: “It really is fascinating to see how big policy decisions impact voter intention. The decision to approve the opening of a new coal mine had the potential to be extremely negative in the eyes of the public, especially given the strength of feeling around the world towards fossil fuels.
“However, a third of Britons supported the move and it appears to have helped the Conservatives make gains across the board on our voter intention and approval rating trackers.
“But when you consider that the cost of living crisis is the UK’s number one concern at the moment - with climate change not even making people’s top five worries - it is perhaps not that surprising.
“Our latest poll showed that Brits are more likely to be concerned about the economy (62%), the NHS (60%), inflation (58%), poverty and inequality (39%) and immigration (34%) than climate change (28%).”
Get the full results here: https://omnisis.co.uk/poll-results/vi-13-results-09-12-2022/
Image credit: Ralph Rawlinson, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons