Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1499757
12 NEWS maltatoday | SUNDAY • 21 MAY 2023 JAMES DEBONO ROBERT Abela's trust rating has in- creased by three points to 37.1%, which is not enough to claw back the ground he lost since February. The latest MaltaToday survey suggests that despite the improvement, the Prime Minister has still not fully recovered from the March poll setback immediately after the revocation of the Steward hospitals contract by the court. In the March survey, Abela's trust rating had dropped to 34% from 45% in Febru- ary. His rival Bernard Grech registers a small decrease of 0.6 points in his trust rating from March figures but remains six points higher than it was in February. In the latest survey, Grech scores a trust rating of 25.5%. Abela remains four points more popu- lar than his party, while Grech still trails the PN by three points. This suggests that Labour has more room for future growth than the PN among the category of voters who trust Abela. But both leaders make little inroads among voters who voted for the opposite party in 2022. While Grech enjoys the trust of 2.9% of PL voters in 2022, Abela captures the trust of 3% of PN voters. But Grech scores better than Abela among non-voters in 2022. Among this category 7.4% trust Grech but only 2.3% trust Abela. Among respondents who now say they will not vote, Abela enjoys a higher trust rating - 8.8% vs. 0.7% who trust Grech. This indicates that while the current crop of non-voters includes more Labour leaning voters, the same cohort in the 2022 election included more PN leaning voters. 52% of under 35s trust neither leader The survey also shows a small two-point decline in the percentage of respondents who trust neither of the two-party lead- ers, who now account for 34.1% of all re- spondents. But their numbers remain six points higher than in February. Moreover among 16- to 35-year-olds 52% trust neither of the two leaders. A relative majority of 36- to 50-year-olds (46%) also trusts neither of the two lead- ers. Abela beats Grech among both men and women and across all age groups. But while Abela enjoys similar levels of trust among both women and men, Grech's trust rating among women is 7.5 points higher than among men. And while Grech trails Abela by just a point among over 65-year-olds, Abe- la's lead grows to a staggering 27 points among 51- to 65-year-olds. Grech trails Abela by eight points among 16- to 35-year-olds and by 15 points among 35- to 50-year-olds. Abela wins all regions except Northern Harbour Abela enjoys a higher trust rating than Grech in all regions except the Northern Harbour region where the latter leads by six points. In the electorally strategic Gozo district Grech trails Abela by five points. Significantly Abela leads by a substantial 25 points in the Northern region which includes several traditionally PN leaning localities like Naxxar as well as the more evenly split Saint Paul's Bay and Mosta. Abela also leads Grech by more than 20 points in the Labour leaning Southern Harbour and South-Eastern regions and by 14 points in the Western region. The percentage of voters who trust nei- ther of the two leaders is lowest in the Northern Harbour region where Grech registers his best trust rating. Non-voters peak at 42% in the South-Eastern region where Grech registers his lowest trust rat- ing. The survey also shows Abela soundly beating Grech among respondents with a secondary and post-secondary level of education, but Grech beats Abela among those with a primary level of education by single point. Among the tertiary educat- ed Abela beats Grech by just two points. Trust boost for Abela not enough to claw back lost ground