Surge in new UK voters sparks youthquake hopes

(7 Dec 2019) In a looming British election dominated by Brexit, young voters who had no say in the country's decision to leave the European Union could hold the key to victory.

That is, if they can be bothered to vote.

It has long been a truth in British politics that young people vote in lower numbers than older ones.

In the last election in 2017, just over half of those aged under 35-years of age voted, compared to more than 70% of those aged over 60.

But that may be changing.

According to UK government figures, 3.85 million people registered to vote between the day the election was called on 29 October and the registration deadline on 26 November with those aged under 35 making up roughly two-thirds of new registrations.

University students were important targets for groups encouraging people to register to vote by the deadline and many campuses across the UK have been hosting hustings events to get students engaged with the upcoming election.

Most opinion polls have Boris Johnson's Conservatives in a lead overall.

About 46 million people are eligible to vote in the December 12 election to fill all 650 seats in the House of Commons, including hundreds of thousands of people who were too young take part in the UK's 2016 Brexit referendum.

But the surge in new young voters is good news for Labour, which is seeking to defy the odds and win a general election for the first time since 2005.

Young voters are more likely than their older compatriots to oppose Brexit, which will end Britons' right to work and live in 27 other European nations and is expected to have an economic impact.

While some analysts are forecasting an electoral "youthquake", others are cautious.

This is a rare December election and turnout could suffer if election day is a wet, cold day.

It's also difficult to gauge how much voters will be motivated by Brexit and how much by domestic issues.

"At this point I'm kind of sick of Brexit," said Susie Chilver, a first-year politics student at the University of Bristol in southwest England.

"So, the things that are swaying it for me are things like social housing, and like health care, things like that, more like social issues than foreign policy," she added.

Dr Jess Garland, Director of Policy and Research at the Electoral Reform Society said that turnout amongst university students could be lower than expected because of the timing of the election.

"We're having a December election for the first time in 100 years and most of those university students will be at home, so potentially not voting in those university seats," Garland said.

Konstantinos Matakos, a senior economics lecturer at King's College London said there was an assumption that young voters were "leaning more Labour" in the lead up to the poll.

"It's not a straightforward assumption to say that this surge in the registration rates will undoubtedly benefit Labour in terms of gaining electoral seats," he said.



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