BORIS Johnson's popularity is at its worst ever level, according to YouGov’s weekly approval ratings tracker.

After weeks of stories about Tory sleaze dominating the headlines, a furious row over Downing Street Christmas parties held while tight Covid rules were in place and anger surrounding policy moves like the scrapping of the HS2 leg to Leeds, the Prime Minister is suffering a major dent to his popularity.

While Johnson has long been very unpopular in Scotland – recording a -62 approval rating here in November – he has generally been better received in England, keeping his net approval level higher than -20 for most of this year.

However that figure has been dropping since September, and over the past few weeks has dramatically declined further.

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Now just a quarter (24%) of the British public have a favourable opinion of the Conservative leader, and two-thirds (66%) are not impressed, leaving him with a net favourability ranking of -42. That represents a fall of 11 points since November 17-18.

However, Labour chief Keir Starmer has not enjoyed a boost to his own ratings despite Johnson’s failures. His support sits ahead at -14, one point down since the beginning of December. Some 48% find Starmer unfavourable, while 34% express positive views on the Labour leader.

Chancellor Rishi Sunak remains more popular though his rating has remained constant at -3, while Home Secretary Priti Patel is very unpopular at -47.

There have been reports that Liz Truss could consider a leadership move if Johnson is ousted, though her own rating suffers from 50% of respondents not knowing if they have an opinion on her. Truss’s spokesperson has described suggestions that she is looking to woo Tory backbenches into supporting her as “total and utter rubbish”.

Meanwhile, on Friday a new poll by Focaldata put Labour eight points ahead of the Conservatives, at 41% to 3% - representing the party’s biggest lead since 2019.