Conservative Islamophobia: new polling shows depths of the party’s crisis

HOPE not hate has released some new polling as the Conservative leadership race enters its final stages. It’s a new YouGov poll of Conservative party members and the results are really quite shocking: a staggering 60% believe that ‘Islam is generally a threat to Western civilisation’.

Only 17% of Conservative members agreed that Islam was ‘generally compatible with Western civilisation’, while a shocking 54% thought that Islam was also ‘generally a threat to the British way of life’.

Conservative party members are most likely to think that Islam poses a threat to the British way of life because “Islam breeds intolerance for free speech and calls for violent actions against those who mock, criticise or depict the religion in ways they believe are offensive” – a huge 61% believe this justification.

These new figures come off the back of HOPE not hate/YouGov polling results released earlier this month, which underline the deeply worrying levels of Islamophobic beliefs among Conservative Party members.

These results are really shocking, especially given the fact that this is a poll of the people who will decide on the next Prime Minister. Whoever is elected as the next Conservative Party leader will also be PM, and they should be ready to govern for the whole country. We’ve called for the Conservatives to hold an independent external inquiry – read more about why, and what that investigation should cover here.

The poll was conducted by YouGov, with a total sample size of 864 adults. The fieldwork was undertaken between 14th – 18th June 2019. The survey was carried out online. The figures have been weighted and are representative of all GB adults (aged 18+).