Elon Musk's popularity rating in UK resurfaces as he continues to attack Starmer on grooming gangs

Twitter/X owner and soon-to-be member of Donald Trump’s second administration, Elon Musk, is continuing to attack Keir Starmer and the Labour government online over its approach to the issue of child sexual exploitation (CSE), but the latest polling from YouGov shows the majority of the British public have an unfavourable view of him.

Despite recently talking about the need for “more positive” posts on his social media platform, Musk has proceeded to fire off a number of inflammatory tweets about UK government ministers as he calls for a national inquiry into CSE and the release of far-right convicted criminal, Tommy Robinson (real name Stephen Yaxley-Lennon).

Not content with cosying up to the US president-elect, he’s now wading into UK politics and demonstrating how little he knows about its institutions and democracy – from calling on King Charles III to unilaterally dissolve parliament, to demanding another general election after there's just been one.

And as the billionaire continues to make headlines for his opinions on the UK political scene – including backing Nigel Farage’s Reform UK – polling agency YouGov has reshared its most recent survey showing how little Brits care about the tech entrepreneur.

Back in November, close to two-thirds (64 per cent) of survey respondents said they had either a somewhat unfavourable or very unfavourable view of Musk, compared to just short of a fifth (18 per cent) saying they had a very favourable or somewhat favourable view of him.

His net favourability among the UK public has slumped from -36 in December 2022 to -46 in both August and November 2024.

To make matters worse, as much as Musk wants to insist upon people calling the social media site by its new name of X, 69 per cent of Brits still call it Twitter.

Awkward.

On Twitter/X, users have taken the opportunity to explain what the polling means in rather colourful terms:

Meanwhile Guardian columnist Owen Jones used the data to condemn the government’s “failure” to defend safeguarding minister Jess Phillips, branding ministers “cowards”:

Elsewhere, health and social care secretary Wes Streeting told the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg this week that Musk’s comments about Phillips were a “disgraceful smear” of a “great woman”.

“[She] has spent her life supporting victims of the kind of violence that Elon Musk and others say that they’re against,” he said.

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