Here’s a question Rats in a Sack never thought it would have to conjure with: is David “Frosty” Frost, the Conservative peer who made a hash of negotiating Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal and has spent the years since blaming everybody else, really Britain’s 13th most popular public figure?
He is, according to pollsters YouGov, who have published their rankings of famous faces’ popularity among the public for the first quarter of 2025. Frost, in 13th, is ranked a place below Zara Tindall but above the likes of Queen Camilla, Bill Clinton and Angela Merkel.
It seems decidedly odd given that the former whisky-peddler who spent 10 months in Boris Johnson’s cabinet is hardly a name likely to trouble the bookers of I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!
YouGov’s rankings get even weirder further down the list where Britain’s 21st most popular public figure, nestling one below Clinton but one ahead of Johnson, is… Laura Trott, the shadow education secretary.
The bizarre rankings means that, according to the pollster, Frost is Britain’s most popular politician and Trott, despite not even being a household name in her own household, is the second most popular Conservative and third most popular politician overall, below Frost and Nigel Farage.
Might it possibly be that… both politicians share their name with a public figure both more well-known and loved? Frost shares his name with the legendary TV host and journalist who passed away in 2013, while Laura Trott is the maiden name under which cyclist Dame Laura Kenny won the bulk of her Olympic medals, making her the most successful British female athlete in Olympic history.
It seems more likely than the fact that the British public have a secret love affair with a crackpot Tory peer and a shadow cabinet minister few could pick out of a police line-up. Which is it, YouGov?
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