Election: Seriously, Register To Vote Today!

Midnight tonight is the deadline for registering to vote on June 8 and students in particular have never had more reason to get involved, with the future of tuition fees and the nature of Britain’s relationship with Europe at stake.

Students generally lean significantly to the Left of the political spectrum as their youthful idealism and academic mindsets come together with the self-interest of tuition fees and state loans.

This time around Labour is promising to abolish tuition fees while the Tories say they will hike the highest fees from £9,000 to £9,250, and universities’ global connections face new barriers from a potential “hard” Brexit.

London is home to four of the world’s top universities according to the Times Higher Education rankings for the 2016-17 academic year: Imperial College (8th), University College (15th), London School of Economics (25th) and King’s College (36th).

A weak youth vote?

According to the Electoral Commission some 207,000 people applied online yesterday to register to vote, taking the total to 2.3m since the beginning of the snap campaign. At the 2015 General Election there were almost 500,000 applications on the last day, so the total should be well over 2.8m by the close of play tonight. Those new voters will include most of the 700,000 Brits who have turned 18 since the last election.

Age was a significant factor dividing voters in the EU Referendum with the young and educated voting heavily to Remain. Anger at being outvoted by their seniors may mobilise a higher turn-out among young voters on June 8.

The pollster YouGov says that 43% of students name tuition fees as their top concern. Labour says that the average student “now graduates from university, and starts their working life, with debts of £44,000. Labour will reintroduce maintenance grants for university students, and we will abolish university tuition fees.”

The next most important issues for students were climate change and the EU but YouGov found that those surveyed were less Left-wing on economic policies. “On all of the core economic issues – taxes for the wealthy, nationalisation, redistribution, wages and the role of the government in the economy – the average student is actually to the right of the general public. This doesn’t mean they tend to fall on the right-wing side of the debate, but simply that they fall on the left-wing side to a lesser extent,” said the pollster.

Vote in London or at home?

With the June election taking place in the university holidays 68% of surveyed students told YouGov that they would actually vote in their home constituencies. That has the potential to help marginal seats but reduces the impact of student-populated areas of London. Read more about this choice here.

This app tells students whether voting at their home address or term-time residence will be more effective. ge2017.com/students

The Conservative Student View

While Conservative students are in the minority they have an active presence in London universities. Rai Gill is the president of University College London Union Conservative Society and suggests a good government needs an effective opposition. “This election will determine, at least for the next generation, which direction Britain seeks to take: whether to remain in the centre ground of politics or to take a leap into the unknown of the far left.

The UK has always been politically moderate and this is reflected in Corbyn’s difficulty in finding traction for his campaign and the strength with which the Conservative Party is now building towards an insurmountable control of government.”

Maciej Psiuch has just been elected as the president of the Imperial College Conservative Society. “This election will be a defining point for the generations to come. It is an opportunity for the Conservatives to strengthen their position though a landslide victory before major Brexit negotiations and a wake-up call for Labour to end its Jeremy Corbyn-centred personality cult structure.”

The Labour and Marxist Student View

Callum Hurley is chair of the Westminster University Labour society and reflects on the negative images plaguing recent Labour leaders. “I think we have a difficult task ahead trying to convince the British people of voting Labour after almost two years of attacks on Jeremy Corbyn and before that five years of attacks on Ed Miliband by a press which is owned by tycoons.”

“Corbyn is a decent, honest politician who was elected twice by a landslide. People agree with his policies, policies that will benefit ordinary people immensely such as free school meals, building a million homes and importantly ending the creeping privatisation of our health service.”

Joe Attard is the outgoing president of King’s College London’s Marxist Society and a member of the Marxist Student Federation that was declared by the Evening Standard as the “sexy socialists”.

 “The dire personal approval ratings for Corbyn reflect unanimous slander from the press, confusion around Brexit and constant internal sabotage by the Blairites.”

“Corbyn’s manifesto is by far the most radical that Labour has proposed in decades and has gone down very well with the public. Meanwhile the Tories have proposed nothing but austerity, tax breaks for the rich and forward-thinking ideas like bringing back fox hunting. There is nothing ‘strong’ or ‘stable’ about refusing to defend your record in a public debate.”

“Corbyn’s proposals ‒ if anything ‒ don’t go far enough. Nationalisation of key utilities, free education and wage hikes are all great policies but taxing the rich to pay for them will result in a massive strike of capital. What we need is to expropriate the bankers and bosses without compensation and place their wealth under democratic control.” 

“If registration rates amongst 18-35 year-olds are anything to go by then that’s a feeling shared by many young people. Right now the choice is clear: austerity, cruelty and hand-outs for the rich or a vision for society based on justice and decency. Britain needs a revolution.”

Stewart Vickers @VickHellfire

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