Electoral Calculus and Find Out Now, for the Daily Telegraph, have a run a poll of members of the 'Establishment' to see how their views compare with those of the general public.
Summary headlines:
'The Establishment' used to evoke an idea of elite institutions and networks of privilege which dominate politics and society. Judges, bowler-hatted civil servants, professors and brigadiers were typical members of a group associated with social and political conservatism.
But these days, the 'Establishment' can also be seen as a "blob" of social liberals pursuing a progressive agenda in institutions which have gone "woke".
But how much do people working in establishment roles actually think differently from the public at large? To shed light on this, Electoral Calculus and Find Out Now ran a poll between 1 September and 1 October 2025 comparing the views of typical GB adults with those working in Establishment jobs.
We interviewed 2,295 members of the 'Establishment', plus a further 1,564 members of the general public as a control group. We defined the 'Establishment' as anyone who works in the following eight occupations. The occupations have been grouped into three sub-groups: Lecturing, Professional and Security.
| Group | Sub-Group | Occupation |
|---|---|---|
| Establishment | Lecturing | School teacher |
| University academic | ||
| Culture and media worker (arts, media, museums, etc) | ||
| Professional | Civil servant | |
| Legal professional (solicitor, barrister, judge) | ||
| Medical professional (nurse, paramedic, doctor) | ||
| Security | Police officer | |
| Member of the armed forces (army, navy, air force) |
We will look at the past voting record of people in the establishment, to see if their political affiliations match those of the general public. We also asked them some political questions so we could put them on a left-right political axis. Finally we can look at some of those questions in details to see whether the Establishment sees particular issues differently from the public.
The Establishment is more supportive of left-of-centre parties than the general population. At the 2024 general election, 54pc of voters chose left-of-centre parties (Labour, Liberal Democrats, Greens) and 39pc chose right-of-centre parties (Conservatives, Reform UK). But Establishment voters split 75-19 in favour of the left parties.
Within the Establishment, the 'Lecturing' class was particularly left-wing with a split of 81-14. The 'Professional' class was a bit more left-wing than the general population, and the 'Security' class was more right-wing.
It should be noted that among all those with university education, the right-left split is 66-26 (source YouGov). Most Establishment members have university degrees, so an Establishment split of around 66-26 could be expected. The actual split of 75-19 is a bit more left-wing than would be expected.
Among those working in police and military roles, votes were fairly evenly divided. There were 28pc voting Conservative, 22pc for Labour, and 21pc each for Reform and the Liberal Democrats.
The 2016 EU referendum revealed sharp divides in political outlooks that carry through to today. Nationally, the vote was almost evenly split, with 52pc choosing Leave and 48pc Remain. The establishment leaned heavily the other way, backing Remain by 68-32. The Lecturing class was particularly unbalanced on 75-25, with three-quarters voting to stay in the EU, while the security class was close to the national average supporting Leave by 51-49.
Among the university educated as a whole, the EU vote was 68-32 for Remain, so the Establishment overall is in line with the university educated. But the educators in the Lecturing group appear less representative.
As well as looking about past voting, we also asked our respondents several questions about their political attitudes. Each question had a "left wing" and a "right wing" answer. By taking an average of a respondent's answers over the nine questions, we get a "left-right position" score. We represent the score as a number of degrees (°) either left or right, such as 20° Left or 10° Right, between the extreme limits of 100° Left and 100° Right. The scores were calibrated so that the average over all British adults is 0°.
This political score measures how far each group leans to the left or right compared with the general public. The centre point for the population is set at zero, so any group with a right-side score is to the right of the general public, and any group with a left-side score is to the left of the general public. Each 'degree' represents a small shift along that spectrum.
When comparing political leanings, Britain's establishment sits clearly left of the general public, averaging 20 degrees left of the national centre. Within that, the lecturing class, which includes teachers, professors and cultural workers, leans 32 degrees left of the general population, putting them well beyond the average voter and matching the position of Labour voters in the 2024 general election, who sit at 33° Left of centre. In other words, the Lecturing Class has similar political attitudes to what you would expect if they only hired Labour voters exclusively.
The overall Establishment score of 20° Left is close to that of the Professional Class (19° Left) and the university educated (18° Left). So the centre of the Establishment has the views you might expect, given they are mostly university educated. Doctors, lawyers and civil servants are not more left or right wing than people with degrees.
At the other end of the spectrum, the security class leans 23 degrees right of the public. Conservative voters in 2024 sit at 36° Right and Reform voters are at 45° Right.
If Reform UK were to be in the government after the next election, they would find the civil servants and other Establishment figures quite a long way from their own supporters in terms of political attitudes.
There are some specific political questions which reveal some of the clearest divides between the general public and the lecturing class. Here are some examples.
When asked if "more should be done to support members of ethnic minority groups in Britain", 37pc of the public disagreed and 30pc agreed. But those in the Establishment agreed by 47-24, and those in Lecturing Class agreed by 61-20. (All figures exclude 'Don't knows'.)
Views on Britain's imperial past show a similar split. When asked if "Britain and other western countries should be ashamed of their imperial past", many more of the general public disagreed than agreed (by 50-27). The Establishment was fairly evenly split (disagreed by 40-37), but the Lecturing class generally felt shame and agreed 44-30.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the armed forces and police disagreed very strongly with this proposition.
Transgender rights also highlight differences in social attitudes. The Establishment tends to agree that more should
be done to support transgender people, but the general public tends to disagree.
Half of the lecturing class (52pc) want more support for transgender people, compared with just 28pc of the public.
On the separate question of whether a transwoman is a women, the general public clearly disagree (57pc), which falls to 41pc for the Establishment, and 35pc for the Lecturing class.
Freedom of speech is under fire in Britain these days. We asked if people agree that
"freedom of speech is often used to hurt minorities and damage society". The general public are split, but slightly more agree than
disagree by 39-36. The Establishment agrees more strongly by 46-26, with the Lecturing class most worried about free speech
by 55-21. Only the police and military are clearly in favour of free speech.
Martin Baxter, CEO of Electoral Calculus, said "Our survey of the Establishment shows that it is no longer the small-c conservative group of old, and is now on the progressive left of British society. Those in teaching and the media particularly are significantly to the left of centre politically. If Reform UK were to form a government, expect some sparks to fly as the Establishment intelligentsia react to ideas which are a very long way from their ideological centre."
Find Out Now polled online, between 1 September - 1 October 2025, both 1,564 national representative GB adults, and also an additional 2,295 GB adults who work in jobs classified as 'establishment'. The two samples were weighted to be representative by gender, age, social grade, other demographics and past voting patterns.
Find Out Now and Electoral Calculus are both members of the British Polling Council and abide by its rules.
Data tables are available here.