To make matters worse for Sunak, his personal ratings among 18 to 25-year-olds are also dire, with a drop from a net score of -20 last autumn, to -44 in the most recent poll.
The Tories are facing an existential threat, as younger voters desert the party in huge numbers, according to a new poll.
The poll, carried out by Savanta for ITV’s youth tracker, found that the Conservatives have suffered ‘a devastating loss of support among young people in recent years that is significantly worse than during the party’s 1997 landslide defeat’.
The Tories are trailing Labour by a massive 47 points among 18 to 25-year-olds, with only 14% saying they intend to vote Conservative in the next general election. The Labour Party has increased its lead by 6 points since Savanta’s last youth tracker for Peston in September 2023.
To make matters worse for Sunak, his personal ratings among 18 to 25-year-olds are also dire, with a drop from a net score of -20 last autumn, to -44 in the most recent poll.
ITV’s Robert Peston posted on X: “The most over used phrase in politics is “existential threat”, but the results of this Savanta poll for #Peston is surely that for the Tory Party:
“The Labour Party has increased its utter dominance over the Conservatives among 18-25 year old’s, with a record high 47-point lead, according to a new poll from Savanta for Peston. The new research, which suggests that only 14% of young voters in the UK are planning to vote Conservative at the next general election, shows an increased lead for Labour of 6 points since Savanta’s last youth tracker for Peston in September 2023.”
Savanta’s polling also suggests significant disenfranchisement among young people, with two thirds (65%) of 18 to 25-year-olds having no trust in politics, and six in ten (59%) saying politicians don’t care about them.
Chris Hopkins, Political Research Director at Savanta said: “Young people not voting Conservative is hardly a new problem, but the sheer scale of their disenfranchisement towards them is a ticking time bomb for the party. All three of our Peston Youth Tracker polls have shown just one in seven young voters would back them, a trend that doesn’t appear to be changing anytime soon.”
Basit Mahmood is editor of Left Foot Forward
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