{"id":146080,"date":"2024-10-02T10:03:37","date_gmt":"2024-10-02T10:03:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/10\/02\/meet-the-young-conservatives-fighting-to-change-their-party\/"},"modified":"2024-10-02T10:03:37","modified_gmt":"2024-10-02T10:03:37","slug":"meet-the-young-conservatives-fighting-to-change-their-party","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/10\/02\/meet-the-young-conservatives-fighting-to-change-their-party\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet the young Conservatives fighting to change their party"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Meet<\/div>


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It’s not every day you bump into a Churchill at the Conservative Party conference.<\/p>\n

Henry Churchill, a 17-year-old distant relative of the former prime minister Sir Winston, is a member of another rare group – young Conservative supporters.<\/p>\n

There are plenty of them here in Birmingham, of course, but Henry thinks there should be more.<\/p>\n

He is calling on the party to “tap into” the growing right-wing youth movements in Europe.<\/p>\n

Compared to a rightward swing among young voters in Italy, Germany, Austria and Spain, there is an apathy for the Conservatives among his peer group.<\/p>\n

In the UK \u201cmost people my age are either voting for Reform or Labour\u201d, says Henry, who is Sir Winston’s fifth cousin four times removed.<\/p>\n

He says his contemporaries believe the Tory Party is \u201cfilled with a bunch of old people trying to make themselves richer\u201d.<\/p>\n

But they\u2019re wrong, Henry argues.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Conservatives can offer people better opportunities to get on and get out into the world – get a good job and start earning money.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Recent European elections show a rightward trend among young voters.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile YouGov data shows the share of the under 25s vote for the Conservatives crashed from 21% in 2019 <\/a>to just 8% at the last election.<\/a><\/p>\n

In 2024, more under 25s voted for Reform UK – they won 9% of the under 25s vote share.<\/p>\n

Labour won 41% of the share of the vote, according to the same survey, with the Liberal Democrats on 16% and the Greens on 18%.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Aayaan Jafferi, an 18-year-old Conservative-leaning student from Dudley, argues that unlike other countries “the right in the UK can’t communicate properly with the young”.<\/p>\n

“In other countries like the US, you have figures like [Republican vice presidential nominee] JD Vance,” according to Aayaan.<\/p>\n

“I’m not saying they’re lovely people, but they can communicate to every age really,” Aayaan says.<\/p>\n

Speeches by Rishi Sunak and other senior Tories are not getting young people “excited enough to get jumping off their chairs to listen to them speak,” he argues.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Henry<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Henry Churchill is the fifth cousin four times removed of the British wartime prime minister Sir Winston Churchill<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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The urgent need to win young voters has been a theme at this year’s Conservative Party Conference. <\/p>\n

Former Tory minister Grant Shapps told the conference, many people who voted Conservative this year won’t do so at the next election “because they will be dead”.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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But the party has “their work cut out for them” according to 20-year-old Tory activist George Pattenden.<\/p>\n

“Back in school there was a natural left-wing leaning to the youth,” George says.<\/p>\n

On top of this the Conservatives have to accept “we\u2019re just not that enthusiastic as a nation” which is why “youth turnout is quite low”, he argues.<\/p>\n

“It is hard to get young people to do anything,” he says.<\/p>\n

He says he “understands the apathy,” as politics is not mandatory in schools, leading many to avoid political debate.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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“I’d say it is very unlikely that our generation turns right now,” Aayaan Jafferi says.<\/p>\n

“Because of social media, we have been kind of trained to think Conservatives bad, Labour good,” he adds.<\/p>\n

Unless the Conservatives “have a radical change” and start offering young people policies to get them housing and starting young families “we’re stuck in this left-wing ideology for young people”.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Milan, 17, a classmate of Jafferi’s, says “growing up under Tory rule has shifted people’s minds against Conservatives”.<\/p>\n

“I think the same thing would have happen if it was 10 years of Labour as well,” she adds.<\/p>\n

In Europe, countries have “had more left wing or centrist parties in power” so the anti-establishment vote is “going right”, another 17-year-old Young Conservative told me.<\/p>\n

He argues the British are not as rebellious as people in other parts of Europe.<\/p>\n

“Just look at our history, we’ve not had revolution for 400 years – it is ingrained in us to be more civil.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Josh, 21, a member of the Young Conservatives, predicts “right-wing support will eventually grow” among his generation – but “not for a good reason”.<\/p>\n

The UK is only a “few years behind Germany and Italy” in the rise of anti-establishment right-wing movements.<\/p>\n

“Brexit relieved some of that right-wing pressure out of the UK,” Josh argues.<\/p>\n

“When people see mainstream centrist parties not delivering and not being true to their word on things like immigration” people his age will eventually turn to more to the right.<\/p>\n

Though rare, young voices at the conference agree the party needs to change to win back young voters. <\/p>\n

The real question is whether the party is ready.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n


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Getty Images It’s not every day you bump into a Churchill at the Conservative Party conference. Henry Churchill, a 17-year-old distant relative of the former prime minister Sir Winston, is a member of another rare group – young Conservative supporters. There are plenty of them here in Birmingham, of course, but Henry thinks there should […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":146081,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/bbcx\/grey-placeholder.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[603],"tags":[487,15575,75,2485,1697,1723],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146080"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=146080"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146080\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":146082,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146080\/revisions\/146082"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/146081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=146080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=146080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=146080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}