Robert Abela’s trust rating among the public has taken a severe hit in the past year, reaching an all-time low of just under five out of 10, according to a survey commissioned by Times of Malta.
Trust in the prime minister had previously never sunk below a rating of 6.5, reaching a peak of 6.9 a year ago.
Abela's trust rating also decreased among Labour voters, dropping from 8.1 a year ago to 6.8 today. More broadly, Abela has seen his trust rating drop across all voting segments.
Notably, his trust among non-voters has dropped by almost two points over the past year, leading to an unusual situation where he has a higher trust rating among PN voters than he does among non-voters.
The survey, carried out by market research firm Esprimi, collected responses between March 9 and 16, a year after an election that saw another landslide victory for the Labour Party. The survey is based on a sample of 600 respondents with a margin of error of 4%.
Abela still trusted more than Grech
Despite this, trust in Abela remains higher than that in PN leader Bernard Grech, which has dropped slightly to 3.8, down from the 4.2 recorded last year.
Grech has experienced similar losses to those of Abela among all voting segments, with his trust rating among non-voters dropping to just three points.
On the whole, Grech trails Abela among all groups of voters except those that voted for PN in the last election and those who said they would vote for the Nationalists if an election were held today.
Muscat’s popularity among PL voters falls by half
Abela remains the preferred choice as PL leader, garnering almost a third of all preferences, with his predecessor Joseph Muscat trailing behind at just 8%. A further third of all respondents said that they would opt for neither of the two.
Significantly, Muscat’s support amongst PL voters appears to be waning, 10 years after he steered the party to a major election landslide victory. Whilst over 30% of PL voters selected Muscat as their preferred leader a year ago, this has now shrunk to 16%.
This has solidified Abela’s lead, where he is now the preferred leader for half of PL voters, a slight increase over his performance last year.