LABOUR now stands neck-and-neck with Reform among Britain’s trade union members after a plunge in support since the general election, according to a new poll.

Research carried out by JL Partners for the Sunday Times newspaper suggests the two parties are tied on 28 per cent among trade unionists as support for Labour crashed by 20 percentage points since the 2024 general election while backing for Reform has climbed by 12 per cent.

The biggest swing came within Unite, whose members in Birmingham were forced to wage a year-long strike against a Labour council seeking to impose swingeing cuts to refuse workers’ pay, while the Labour government refused to intervene.

Labour’s biggest donor saw support for the party among its membership plummet from 47 per cent to 30 per cent while backing for Reform grew from 20 to 36 per cent since Sir Keir Starmer came to power.

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham called the poll “damning but not surprising,” adding: “Labour has abandoned the working class, and now the working class has abandoned Labour.”

FBU general secretary Steve Wright said Labour’s woes were a “consequence of Keir Starmer’s government failing to break with Tory austerity and properly deliver for workers,” while TSSA general secretary Maryam Eslamdoust said it showed Labour “desperately needs a leader with real solutions to the cost-of-living crisis.”

Revelling in the poll, Reform leader Nigel Farage — whose party opposed the recent Employment Rights Act — claimed he wanted to seek a “sensible relationship” with unions.

Communist Party general secretary Alex Gordon told the Star: “Workers are looking for any port in a storm, and finding false friends.

“Reform opposed the creation of GB Rail, and tried to ban rail workers from taking strike action.

“They are no friend of the workers, whether they are trade unionists or not.”

A Labour spokesman said: “Labour is, and always has been, the party of working people, from delivering the biggest upgrade of workers’ rights in a generation to boosting the national minimum and living wage.

“There is still more to be done to ease the pressure of the cost of living and put more money back in people’s pockets, and that is exactly what we will continue working every day to deliver.”