Election results: Huge youth vote 'swings election for Labour'

Early figures point to more than 20 point rise in turnout among 18 to 24-year-olds since 2015

Lucy Pasha-Robinson
Sunday 11 June 2017 09:04 BST
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Election 2017: How the night unfolded

A huge surge in the youth vote may have proved crucial to Jeremy Corbyn's shock gains on election night.

The turnout for 18 to 24-year-olds was 66.4 per cent, according to Sky News data, figures which represent a substantial rise from the 43 per cent figure in the 2015 general election.

According to Sky data, 63 per cent of 18 to 34-year-olds voted Labour, with 27 per cent voting Conservative.

Close to 250,000 young people registered to vote ahead of the deadline for Thursday’s election, up from 137,400 on the last day of registrations in 2015, as Mr Corbyn positioned himself as the young person’s candidate.

His success is being attributed to his ability to engage the group with popular policies, including abolishing higher education tuition fees.

He also received heavy celebrity endorsement, with support from grime artists Stormzy and JME, and celebrities Lily Allen and rapper Professor Green.

Labour has won the majority of seats where turnout was up by more than five per cent, with the party’s election day hopes historically hinging on high turnout.

The overall turnout of the election was 68.7 per cent – an increase of 2.6 per cent from 2015.

David Cameron’s former director of communications Andy Coulson said the "youth vote has come out in strength and lashed out pretty aggressively".

He told ITV it was an understatement to say the Conservative campaign "has not been a success" and said the "disconnection" with voters was to blame.

It comes after a hung parliament was declared on Friday amid calls for Theresa May to resign after her decision to call a snap election disastrously backfired.

With no party holding an absolute majority in the House of Commons, Ms May pledged to offer “stability” if the Tories end up as the largest party with the most votes.

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