These days when it rains for the Tories, it pours. Now it transpires that more voters under the age of 30 backed Nigel Farage’s Reform UK than the Conservatives this election – with experts convinced that recent years of economic instability is pushing younger voters away from the two largest parties. How curious…
Over 35,000 voters were surveyed by YouGov – with the pollster finding that of those aged between 18 and 30 years old, 9.5 per cent backed the Farage-founded group with just 8 per cent turning to the Tories. While it’s more bad news for Rishi Sunak’s boys in blue, Reform can’t quite claim victory among Gen-Zers yet. During the election campaign, Farage claimed that there was a notable ‘awakening in a younger generation who have had enough of being dictated to’. But while Reform outperformed the Tories in this age group, it seems the, er, Green party actually beat both groups – with 18 per cent of the under-30s supporting the eco-zealots. Good heavens…
Reform’s leader certainly saw rather striking social media success amongst Generation Z. Over the election campaign Farage received over 39 billion views on Twitter – with his Eminem-inspired videos a rather popular highlight. Meanwhile Sunak amassed just five billion views with the Tory party itself racking up a mere three billion video views – despite, as Mr S revealed in June, members trying to engage voters with some rather odd anti-Reform attack ads…
Pre-election, ex-PM Sunak was warned that his party faced a ‘ticking time bomb’ with its support projected to plummet amongst younger voters. Now that has come to pass, potential leadership candidates will have to consider how to address their dwindling youth base – particularly after analysis this week found that one in six Tory voters are likely to die before the next election. Will a rightward shift woo first-time Reform supporters back, or should the Conservatives be looking towards the centre-ground to win over younger voters? That’s one for the next Tory leader to decide…
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