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October 2, 2024 - 1:30pm
Conservative Party conference, Birmingham
Closing the Conservatives’ annual conference in Birmingham this afternoon, Kemi Badenoch made a play for the group whose support her party may need to reverse its heavy losses in July’s general election: Britain’s youth. The leadership candidate claimed that young Conservatives “tell me that they are afraid to share their politics with other students because they’ll be attacked, that they are marked down by lecturers because of their beliefs”.
She added that the Tory Party has “let young Conservatives down. We need to defend them, champion them, give them a proper party they can be proud of.” It was a striking statement for a party which haemorrhaged its share of the youth vote earlier this year, but is it already too late?
New polling from Savanta reveals that young Conservatives who deserted the party in July — succumbing to the clutches of Reform UK, Labour, the Liberal Democrats or apathy — are unlikely to return to the fold in 2029. Of those aged under 45 who switched away from the Tories between 2019 and 2024 or who didn’t vote Conservative in either election but would consider doing so in future, 56% have claimed they will not be opting for the party next time. One in five former young Conservatives have ruled out voting for the party ever again.
The four leadership candidates are only too aware of this problem. In her Monday appearance on the main stage, Badenoch stated that the Tories “cannot be the party of old people”, given that the average age at which voters are more likely to become a Conservative is 63. “Building homes is critical to that,” the Shadow Housing Secretary added. “We can’t be the party of the people who have something and not the party of the people who want to have something.” Speaking at an event later that evening, her rival Robert Jenrick expressed his wish for “hundreds of thousands more homes to be built in this country”.
Even Shadow Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, an MP for almost 20 years, claimed this week that his party’s “biggest strategic challenge” is the age of its median voter. He argued that finding support among young Britons is a “litmus test” for the overall health of the Tory mission. However, that he suggested targeting “30-somethings, 40-somethings starting out on their life” — rather than the Right-leaning 20-somethings the Conservatives have lost to Reform — was itself telling.
I came to Birmingham expecting to find a few young Tories flirting with the idea of switching to Nigel Farage, but most were resolute. One 23-year-old member told me that “Reform will break all its promises on immigration” — a sentiment echoed an hour later by Badenoch, who said at an evening event that the Right-wing party “makes promises without delivering them” and is “offering easy solutions” rather than hard truths. Another member, aged 26, claimed that he still struggled to “destigmatise” his political beliefs in the eyes of his friends, but that he hadn’t considered changing his vote in July.
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SubscribeI’m never voting for them. They spent decades promoting the neoliberalism that ruined this country. Ditto for Reform. Reform are just neoliberals who hate immigrants.
Britain is a small island nation with very few resources. It needs trade.
Very few resources? What resources are you talking about? Copper? Lithium? The only resource that has ever mattered anywhere ever is… people. And the UK has had some of the most influential and important of those in world history. Perhaps they will yet find some more of them.
The main thing the UK needs to do is stop listening to experts and academics and recommit to the basic principles that made it the worlds most powerful nation… limited govt, a free market, the rule of law not men, strong higher education institutions, etc. Show me a country that dedicated itself to those principles and didn’t get wealthier…
Beautifully concise truism in your last sentence
I hope that they go extinct if they look like the photograph in the article. Yuk!
Agreed, looks very effeminate
Having a cheeky smoke though. Bad boys wear tasselled loafers!
Conservative cosplayer, like the former MP Mr Rees-Mogg.
”One 23-year-old member told me that “Reform will break all its promises on immigration” — a sentiment echoed an hour later by Badenoch, who said at an evening event that the Right-wing party “makes promises without delivering them” and is “offering easy solutions” rather than hard truths.”
Well the Tories would know about this because they were very skilled in office at breaking promises and indulging in slop and performative rubbish.
Hmm. Let’s trust the party that has habitually lied about immigration.
Simplistic lying only works if dealing with a simplistic audience.
Well anyone who keeps supporting the Tories after years of betrayal and gaslighting has to be quite simple. Same goes with Labour voters tbh – they keep voting to be betrayed.
Point being lost a bit – if Right wing supporters keep thinking there are simple solutions to the things that really bug them and do not become more discerning in really conveying they want to see and understand the substance behind the slogan, they will continue to be deeply disappointed.
When are you going to finish with your simplistic lying?
Conservatives are very unlikely to capture young conservatives, for the simple reason that they no longer govern conservatively.
Farage and his party will scoop up most of them.
V unlikely. Once Farage has to actually show his Policy hand in anything outside immigration the fact he offers next to nothing for the young becomes more apparent. And majority of young will be turned off by the underlying prejudice and racial reflex. They’ve grown up in different era to the Dulwich College silver spoon Nige. He’ll get some of course. BNP and NF always attracted some sad, largely, males.
My 18 year old son and all his friends voted Reform because they saw Nigel Farage on Tok Tok and liked his message on immigration even though they would like to see reverse migration. They love in a suburb of Sputh East London and would ever dream of voting Conservative even though they are also aspirational and dislike ” benegit scroungers”. Unless the Tories meet their views on immigration then their voting intention will not change and tne Tories are doomed.
If your son and his friends read your comment, they might permit themselves a gentle smile: Even I (aged 62) know that it’s TikTok. But good luck to you all.
Well there you go then, that’s a proper Survey done.
Funnily enough there was a bloke down the Pub last night who said Farage all mouth and trousers and would never vote for him in million years.
So Reform is a party “which makes promises without delivering them”! Quite unlike the Conservatives, of course.
Did the Conservatives actually offer any policies which were favourable to younger voters at the last election? (Genuine question, but surely the most publicised policy relevant to the young was the reintroduction of national service.)
Good to remind us of that brainwave. However the fact it was policy proposal reflected the Tories/Right Focus groups conclusion it would be popular amongst it’s core vote – and that was what it was trying to shore up.
8 million less homes than France (similar population) is a much bigger reason our youngsters struggle with a home of their own. The deflection onto immigrants by many on the Right a combination of acute ignorance, prejudice and a malign appreciation dog whistles often work with some, the latter initially at least.
More fundamentally, and as Kemi recognises, the Right is stuffed because it can’t square a continuation of protecting the advantage of it’s core blue rinse brigade with giving a much fairer chance to our young.
That’s then compounded by the continued failure to move beyond slogans to actual practical policy solutions. Which means they’d just repeat what they did last 14 years if put back into power. That’d be the same for Farage – he’s no practical, honest policies either, but smart enough to know he doesn’t need them to keep raking it in.
You are unhinged. No amount of logic or evidence presented will stop you writing nonsense.
I have noticed logic and evidence your strong suit AR.
JW, when ideology comes up against reality, reality always wins. Ideology is for people who reject logic and evidence for dreams and wishes.
A party whose main agenda points are “increase pensions” , “do not build any housing” , “let’s import migrant labour rather than pay decent wages to British workers”, “NHS is the most important goal of the state” should not expect a huge turnout among young people.
In Netherlands, there is a party called 65+ that caters exclusively to elderly interests. In the UK, you have the tory party, soon to be eclipsed by Reform.