Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Xavier Bettel currently holds the top position in political popularity, while Prime Minister Luc Frieden has once again failed to make it into the top ten.
Conducted by Ilres for RTL and the Luxemburger Wort between 16 and 26 June, shortly after the latest tripartite negotiations, the Politmonitor survey found that 49% of respondents viewed the performance of the coalition between the Christian Social People’s Party (CSV) and the Democratic Party (DP) favourably, while 36% rated it negatively.
As in previous editions, the survey assessed the public's perceptions of politicians' competence and likeability.
Based on respondents' personal impressions, PM Luc Frieden does not appear to have gained any significant popularity boost from the tripartite agreement. However, he has also avoided losing further ground. Frieden remains in twelfth place, with an approval rating of 52.6%, up slightly by 0.6 percentage points.
Within the CSV, Minister of Agriculture and Sports Martine Hansen leads the internal rankings with a solid 60.6% approval. Meanwhile, Health and Social Security Minister Martine Deprez appears to have benefited from her handling of several high-profile dossiers that have recently placed her in the public spotlight.
She recorded the largest gains in likeability and competence within the CSV, with her rating rising by 5.2 points. Minister of Finance Gilles Roth and Minister for Home Affairs Léon Gloden both saw slight declines in their approval ratings.
Notably, Gloden dropped from 15th to 21st place in the overall rankings. Chamber President Claude Wiseler experienced the most significant decline in the entire Politmonitor, losing seven points compared to the previous survey.
Xavier Bettel continues to enjoy broad public support, leading the government's popularity ratings with approximately 80% approval. There has been little change in perceptions of his likeability and competence compared to previous surveys.
Within the DP, Luxembourg City Mayor and MP Lydie Polfer has seen a slight dip in her popularity ratings, though she continues to perform solidly. In contrast, Minister for Digitalisation and Higher Education Stéphanie Obertin has experienced a more significant decline, losing over five percentage points.
Obertin now ranks at the bottom of the coalition government on both likeability and competence, with a growing gap compared to her colleagues.
Almost all politicians from the Luxembourg Socialist Workers' Party (LSAP) have seen their approval ratings slip slightly, though this does not necessarily mean a poorer performance in the rankings.
Paulette Lenert remains the party's most popular politician, despite her recent decision to retire from politics – which means her name will not appear in future surveys.
Mars Di Bartolomeo remains among the party’s top three figures, while Dudelange deputy mayor and former party president Dan Biancalana recorded the sharpest decline, losing four points following his recent resignation as LSAP president.
Representatives from Luxembourg's smaller parliamentary groups and political sensitivities have been unable to improve their standing with the public. Within the Alternative Democratic Reform Party (ADR), only Alexandra Schoos saw a slight improvement, while both Fred Keup and Tom Weidig experienced declines of more than four points.
Notably, Tom Weidig recorded the lowest score among all politicians, with an average of just 9.4 percent. The Greens (déi gréng) fared slightly better, as Sam Tanson, Meris Šehović, and Joëlle Welfring each lost between 2.5 and 3.5 points; this comes as Joëlle Welfring has announced her resignation from the Chamber.
The Pirate Party (Piratepartei) saw mixed results: Sven Clement dropped by 4.8 points in both sympathy and competence ratings, while Marc Goergen managed to gain three points.
Meanwhile, MPs of The Left (déi Lénk), Marc Baum and David Wagner, both suffered slight losses in this edition of the Politmonitor, although both improved their positions in the overall rankings.
When it comes to name recognition among political figures, Xavier Bettel leads with 98%, closely followed by PM Luc Frieden and Minister of Education and Housing Claude Meisch, who scored 96%.
Despite high recognition, Claude Meisch ranks as the second least popular member of the government in the popularity ranking. Maurice Bauer of the CSV proves the least known member of the CSV.
The Politmonitor shows that 49% of respondents currently rate the government's performance positively, indicating a 1% increase from last year.
Although this marks only a modest improvement, the number of people who view the coalition's work negatively has dropped more significantly, from 43% at the end of last year to 36% now.
It is not surprising that 91% of CSV voters are satisfied with the government's performance. Despite the party's participation in the governing coalition, support among DP voters has fallen to just 69%.
Meanwhile two thirds of LSAP voters and 69% of the ADR voters assess the performance of the current coaltion negatively.
The representative survey was conducted by Ilres on behalf of RTL and the Luxemburger Wort. A total of 1,020 respondents were asked about their awareness and perception of Luxembourg's politicians.
The interviews were carried out by telephone and online via Ilres's MyPanel platform between 16 and 26 June.
Further information on the questionnaire and survey methodology is available on alia.lu.
For the first time, this edition of the Politmonitor presents results to one decimal place, allowing for more precise comparisons between politicians and across different editions of the survey. However, this greater level of detail may lead to slight discrepancies when the latest figures are compared with results from previous editions, owing to differences in rounding.
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