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Telegraph link - Media Bias?
(right)

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Could a higher youth turnout swing the election?

The UK's First Past the Post voting system is unhelpful in this regard because it leads to a lot of constituencies in which the result is almost a foregone conclusion. This means it's very unlikely that a higher youth turnout would be enough to reverse a landslide one way or another.

However, there are still around 40 constituencies where the ruling MP could be displaced if turnout among the 18-24 age group reached the same levels it did in the EU referendum.

A prime example of this is Derby North where the Conservatives beat Labour by a majority of just 41 votes in 2015.

According to the ONS nearly 13,000 people aged 18-24 live in this constituency meaning that there would be an extra young 2,204 voters if turnout rose from 43 to 60 per cent - more than enough to swing it.

Similarly, Labour's margin of victory in the City of Chester was just 93 votes in 2015. If turnout rose to 60 per cent among 16-24 year olds this would mean an extra 1,800 voters casting ballots.

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A million young people register to vote in month since election called

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The UK's First Past the Post voting system is unhelpful in this regard because it leads to a lot of constituencies in which the result is almost a foregone conclusion. This means it's very unlikely that a higher youth turnout would be enough to reverse a landslide one way or another.

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Guardian link - Media Bias? (left)

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Can't be bothered to vote? If you're young, you simply can't afford not to

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Voter apathy among the 18-24 age group has seen the advent of tuition fees and cuts to housing benefit and student grants. It's time to turn out to reverse this cycle, writes Armando Iannucci

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YouGov  info on  Compulsory voting

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55% of British people support making it compulsory to vote in general elections - but young people are less supportive

An influential think tank has recommended making it compulsory for young people to vote in the first general election they are able to, not long after US president Barack Obama said compulsory voting for everyone could be ' transformative'. Australian citizens already face fines if they do not vote, and research suggests that compulsory voting can develop habitual engagement, lending support for the measure as a remedy to the UK's declining voter turnout since the 1990s.

In the middle of the election campaign, YouGov asks if people have a duty to vote on May 7th, and if they should be forced.

Most British people (55%) would support making it compulsory for everyone to vote in general elections, with majority support reaching across all the political parties. YouGov research in America found a completely different picture, with 66% opposed to compulsory voting.

British 18-24 year olds, who were 23% less likely than over-65s to vote in 2010, are the only demographic to not support compulsory voting by a majority (46% support, 38% oppose). Over-60s, on the other hand, support the idea by 62-34%.

While the vast majority agree that people do have a duty to vote (80%), young people are also the least likely (68%) to think such a duty exists.

Despite strong support for compulsory voting, British people may wish there was a better way to encourage voter engagement. Most people (53%) say it is an individual's responsibility to decide whether to vote, rather than saying the government should work more to get people to vote (39%). And in a choice between compulsory voting and putting politics on the national curriculum, people are divided 32-32%.

In the general election of 1950, turnout was 83.9%. When Tony Blair was elected in 1997 turnout was 71.4%, but during his time in power it sunk to 59.4% in 2001 - the lowest level since 1918. This has since recovered slightly, to 65.1% in 2010.
PA images See the full poll results

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Majority support for compulsory voting | YouGov

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An influential think tank has recommended making it compulsory for young people to vote in the first general election they are able to, not long after US president Barack Obama said compulsory voting for everyone could be ' transformative'.

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YouGov info on how Britain Voted in GE2017 - includes breakdown of ages

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YouGov conducts one of Britain's biggest ever post-election surveys to chart how the nation's political character is shifting

Since last week's election result YouGov has interview over 50,000 British adults to gather more information on how Britain voted. This is part of one of the biggest surveys ever undertaken into British voting behaviour, and is the largest yet that asks people how they actually cast their ballots in the 2017 election.

The bigger sample size allows us to break the results down to a much more granular level and see how different groups and demographics voted on Thursday.

Age

In electoral terms, age seems to be the new dividing line in British politics. The starkest way to show this is to note that, amongst first time voters (those aged 18 and 19), Labour was forty seven percentage points ahead. Amongst those aged over 70, the Conservatives had a lead of fifty percentage points.

In fact, for every 10 years older a voter is, their chance of voting Tory increases by around nine points and the chance of them voting Labour decreases by nine points. The tipping point, that is the age at which a voter is more likely to have voted Conservative than Labour, is now 47 - up from 34 at the start of the campaign.

Despite an increase in in youth turnout, young people are still noticeably less likely to vote than older people. While 57% of 18 and 19 year-olds voted last week, for those aged 70+ the figure was 84%.

Class

As noted at the start of the campaign, the class divide in British politics seems to have closed and it is no longer a very good indicator of voting intention. Despite dramatic voter movements towards Labour over the past few weeks this theme has held reasonably consistent: Labour is now 4% behind amongst ABC1 voters and 2% behind amongst C2DE voters.

The picture is a bit more mixed if we split this out further, with Labour doing best amongst DE voters (semi-skilled and unskilled manual occupations, unemployed people and those in the lowest grade occupations) and the Tories doing best amongst C2 voters (skilled manual occupations).

Education

Alongside age, education has become one of the key electoral demographic dividing lines. We saw it was a huge factor in the EU referendum campaign and, after the last general election, we made sure we accounted for educational qualifications in our methodology. In last week's vote, while the Conservatives' support decreases the more educated a voter is, the opposite was true for Labour and the Lib Dems.

Amongst those with low educational qualifications (defined as GCSE or equivalent or below) the Conservatives beat Labour by 22%. However amongst those with high level educational qualifications (defined as degree-level or above) Labour led by 17 percentage points. Part of this relationship is down to age - the expansion of education means that, on average, the young have more qualifications than the old, although the Conservatives still have a "graduate problem" even after accounting for this.

Gender

There was only a small gender gap between men and women, with women being equally split between Labour and the Conservatives (43% to 43%), and men slightly more likely to have backed the Tories (45% to 39%).

Employment status

Given the importance of age and voting it is not surprising that there is also a link between people's employment status and who they cast their ballot for. The Conservatives are 39 points ahead amongst retirees and Labour are 45 points ahead amongst full-time students.

Labour is in fact ahead amongst those in work: 4 points ahead amongst those working part time and 6 points ahead amongst those working full time, illustrating how the Conservatives are increasingly relying on the grey retired vote.

Newspaper

Beyond standard demographics, our data also shows a wide variation in voting behaviours based on the newspapers people read. The most pro-Conservative newspapers are the broadsheet Telegraph (+67), but also the "blue-top" Express (+62) and Daily Mail (+57).

The most pro-Labour newspapers are the Guardian (+65), the now fully-online Independent (+51), and the Daily Mirror (+49). This is based on the newspaper that respondents say they read "most often".

Photo: PA
See the full results here

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How Britain voted at the 2017 general election | YouGov

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Since last week's election result YouGov has interview over 50,000 British adults to gather more information on how Britain voted. This is part of one of the biggest surveys ever undertaken into British voting behaviour, and is the largest yet that asks people how they actually cast their ballots in the 2017 election.

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Adam Hills & Sue Perkins Encourage Young People to Vote | The Last Leg