Main Edition
US
FR
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.
Join the discussion
Join like minded readers that support our journalism by becoming a paid subscriber
To join the discussion in the comments, become a paid subscriber.
Join like minded readers that support our journalism, read unlimited articles and enjoy other subscriber-only benefits.
Subscribe”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.
I hope that they go extinct if they look like the photograph in the article. Yuk!
Agreed, looks very effeminate
I’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.