Young men are not turning to rightwing politics more than any other demographic, according to a study of election data, which undermines claims that this group has been a key driver of the recent success of parties such as Reform UK. The analysis of data from the British Election Study, which polls about 30,000 people every year, showed age to be a bigger determining factor in voters’ political opinions than gender. And while men aged 18 to 25 are less progressive than women of the same age, they remain more progressive, and less likely to vote for rightwing parties, than any other age group of men. Analysts at the Institute for Public Policy Research, which carried out the study, said the findings should prompt politicians to rethink how they engage with young men, who are sometimes written off as lost to misogynistic online influencers. Dr Chris Bick, the lead author of the report, said: “There is a sense that young men are shifting rapidly to the right, but we have not found much evidence for that at all. They remain the most progressive cohort of men across a raft of issues.” He added: “If you are interested in advancing progressive politics, this is still a base of support for you. Politicians looking to appeal to younger voters will have to make sure they do not alienate this cohort by trying too much to appeal to older voters.” Many commentators have highlighted the apparent appeal of populist rightwing politics for young men in recent years in the UK and abroad. Politicians have warned about the rise of online influencers such as Andrew Tate who, as part of the “manosphere”, have looked to appeal to young men with messages about aggression and misogyny. Some Labour MPs have become so concerned about the political alienation of young men that they recently set up a group specifically to spread messages among that group and steer them away from “toxic influencers”. Polls showed populist rightwing parties were doing better with young men than with young women. Recent research from King’s College London showed 13% of young men aged between 18 and 24 voted for Reform UK compared with just 6% of women. But the IPPR research showed that, while young men have moved further to the right in recent years, they have only done so in line with other groups, and remained considerably more progressive as a bloc than other age groups. The data showed that support for conservative parties among men aged 18 to 25 rose from about 18% in 2022 to just under 30% in 2025. This mirrored the rise among older men, about 35% of whom supported conservative parties in 2022, compared with more than 50% last year. More recently, men aged 18 to 25 have become about 5 percentage points more likely to support Reform UK since the election – far less than men and women of any older age group, among whom support for the party has surged. On a series of issues, including immigration, race, women’s rights and homosexuality, young men are more progressive than older ones. They are, however, more conservative than women of the same age, with the gap between the sexes more noticeable among younger people than older ones. Bick said that while a gender gap had emerged among young voters on many issues, this was being driven more by younger women turning to the left than young men going right. Younger women are far more likely to support greater diversity in school curriculums, for example, or to believe that children’s television shows should portray more same-sex families than any other group. “Young women are moving to the left more than young men are moving to the right,” he said. “Though that divergence is more noticeable in other countries.”

Young men in UK are not more rightwing than older groups, study says

Polls open in historic byelection in Makerfield that could determine Keir Starmer’s future – as it happened

It’s one of the great philosophical questions of our age. Or any age, for that matter. If Liz Truss didn’t exist, would it be possible to imagine her? Could anyone conceive that someone so brain-meltingly dim could have once been our prime minister? And even if they could, would they have dared to believe that in harness with this industrial-strength stupidity there could be such a total lack of self-awareness. Liz comes with a vacuum-packed confidence in her own talent. While the real world treats her, at best as a joke, at worst as the last cockroach still standing, she maintains her messiah complex. The saviour waiting to rise from these streets. In LizWorld, the problem is not that we had too much of her. It’s that we never got enough. And there’s a bit of me that can’t help agreeing. Forty-nine days – really, 39 days, as during the 10 days of state mourning for the late queen, Liz was prevented from doing any actual harm – was just too short. Yes, I know she still crashed the economy and left us all worse off, but that was almost a price worth paying for white-knuckle ride entertainment. You wait more than 200 years for a prime minister this unsuited to high office, and I was fortunate enough to have a ringside seat. Just think what she might have achieved had she been able to stick around for a few more months. A UK on its knees. These days, though, Truss lives a mysterious half-life. Split between the real world and the meta-world. Both existing and not existing. Occasionally spotted making incoherent speeches to small gatherings of the far right in the US, but mostly confined to a small attic space that doubles as the studio for her no expense incurred The Liz Truss Show on her YouTube channel. Each episode of which deserves the accolade of “mini-classic”. Just not in the way she might have hoped. Because with every outing, she goes from bad to worse. Late on Wednesday, Liz released her latest offering. Boldly called “Labour’s Secret Plan: Labour PANICKING as Reform surges in Makerfield By-Election”. This promised to be the inside story on Makerfield. An on-the-ground exposé of what all the major media outlets had missed. A perspective so radical it would change everyone’s perceptions. And to help her, Liz had gone to the very top. No need for John Curtice, every TV channel’s go-to expert for polling analysis. Nor for the equally brilliant Rob Ford, the man the Beeb uses when Curtice is unavailable. Instead, Liz had signed up June Slater. A former Ukip member, political blogger and occasional talking head on GB News. The psephologist’s psephologist. The election guru of our times. June wasted no time in getting down to it. Even though most anecdotal evidence from the constituency suggests Labour is likely to win relatively comfortably with even Reform privately admitting it would need a miracle, Liz and June saw things differently. Labour was definitely panicking. Or PANICKING as Truss put it. We knew this because Slater had been up to Makerfield and spent a day campaigning with Rob Kenyon, the Reform candidate, and all she had seen were voters throwing palm leaves at his feet. “Rob is a very busy man,” she confided. “A quiet man, a bit of a thinker. Like my husband. When someone brought up a problem he got his phone out.” This must be the man who thinks so deeply he openly admits he’s a sexist, refuses to apologise for offensive remarks to Carol Vorderman, reckons Russia had a point when they invaded Ukraine, and isn’t entirely certain whether he supported Brexit or not. But this, apparently, was why voters were switching to Reform in their thousands. June did concede that some people were reluctant to vote Reform because “they don’t want to appear hateful”. Though she appeared bewildered as to why this should be. Liz just nodded. It was a mystery. It surely can’t have been anything to do with Nigel Farage calling for “pure, cold rage” after the murder of Henry Nowak. Or Zia Yusuf and Robert Jenrick promising to deport all foreigners. Including Europeans with settled status. Though, as a gesture of goodwill, their children would be allowed to stay and be put up for adoption if they were born in the UK. Next we got on to “Labour’s Secret Plan”. This turned out to be so secret that literally everyone had heard of it. Apart from Liz and June. Somehow they had been kept out of the loop. The byelection had been called because Andy Burnham was trying to get back into Westminster so that he could challenge Keir Starmer to become prime minister. Who could possibly have guessed? Stay tuned with Liz and new vistas will open up. After that the conversation drifted. June admitted there had been a time prior to the Brexit referendum when she had considered voting remain, but had luckily changed her mind when her husband had pointed out that the EU was basically a communist state. Liz nodded eagerly. Grateful for the brainwipe, so she had no recollection she had been a Tory minister actively campaigning for remain a decade ago. We moved on to Covid and the importance of not getting vaccinated. How people just had to see a picture of Starmer to provoke a kneejerk response that he was Chinese. Looking at photos of Farage and thinking of Russia was a definite plus, however. June started to get a bit maudlin. She used to have a house in Austria but now there was nowhere she really wanted to live. “The Blob” was everywhere. It won’t be long before she holes up in the wilds of Montana with a few dozen semi-automatic weapons. The last word went to Liz. She, too, saw the malign influence of “the Blob” in every nook and cranny of the British state. The country was being lost. Labour had infiltrated every organisation. But at least we would always have her. While she still drew breath, there was hope. Never underestimate the power of the quarter-wit.

Truss the saviour exposes ‘Labour’s secret plan’ | John Crace

Zack Polanski has been cleared by an ethics inquiry looking into complaints that he did not pay council tax while living on a houseboat. A report by the Greater London authority’s monitoring officer found that the circumstances of the Green party leader’s living arrangements were beyond its scope and he had therefore not breached the code of conduct for London assembly members. The complaints from Labour and the Conservatives alleged that Polanski had breached the requirements of the ethics code because he had not paid council tax while living on a houseboat in east London from 2022. Polanski, who previously apologised for the “unintentional mistake”, revealed in his evidence to the monitoring officer that it had still not been established whether any tax was due and that the site of the boat fell on the border of two local authorities. As part of the inquiry, he told the monitoring officer that he had “personal experience of financial hardship and housing insecurity”. He previously said he had not been living at the marina full-time but at another address as a lodger, before it emerged that he had occupied the boat for a couple of years before moving to a house. In his witness statement, Polanski said he had never had any intention to “evade council tax, avoid legal obligations or obtain any improper financial advantage” and it remained unclear whether he had actually failed to pay the proper tax. “Any failure to appreciate the position arose solely from a misunderstanding of what was required in relation to an unusual and unconventional living arrangement,” he wrote. “Having lived through periods of economic difficulty on a limited income, I understand first-hand the challenges faced by many Londoners,” he wrote in his statement. “My previous living arrangements reflected those circumstances rather than any attempt to avoid financial obligations. “Whilst I accept that greater care could have been taken in understanding the practical implications of my unconventional housing arrangements, I strongly refute suggestions that my honesty or integrity should be called into question.” Polanski also revealed that he had lived for five years as a property guardian, occupying an otherwise vacant building under licence in return for modest fees. “This was one of the few affordable housing options available to me in London during a period marked by economic uncertainty, austerity measures and significant cost-of-living pressures,” he said. “Under those property guardianship arrangements, I paid a licence fee to the relevant provider and, as was my understanding and experience throughout that period, utilities and council tax liabilities were managed and covered through those arrangements. Whilst unconventional, this became my normal experience of housing administration and associated household outgoings.” He said that when he moved to the narrowboat in August 2022, he believed that council tax was included in the moorings fees “given the nature of the arrangement, my previous experience of property guardian accommodation”. He added: “I readily acknowledge that I did not undertake further inquiries at the time regarding the specific council tax implications of living on a narrowboat. This is why I have already unreservedly apologised for that unintentional mistake.” Polanski also raised concerns that the complaints were politically motivated and said they had been promoted under the guise of public interest yet appeared to aim to advantage his opponents. The Green party said: “The monitoring officer for the Greater London Authority has conducted an independent inquiry into the complaints made against Mr Polanski and decided to take no further action. We therefore consider this matter closed.” Neil Garratt, the Conservative assembly member who originally complained about Polanski, said his actions had shown a “cavalier attitude” to establishing whether tax was due.

Zack Polanski cleared by ethics inquiry over council tax payment complaint

With the 10th anniversary of the 2016 EU referendum result approaching, we would like to hear from people on how the vote affected their relationships with family and/or friends. Perhaps you voted differently from a parent, child, sibling, partner, or friend, which caused tension and conflict. If so, a decade on, have you been able to heal the rift, move past your differences or has it damaged your relationship beyond repair? Tell us.

Politics.

Polls open in historic byelection in Makerfield that could determine Keir Starmer’s future – as it happened

Truss the saviour exposes ‘Labour’s secret plan’ | John Crace

Zack Polanski cleared by ethics inquiry over council tax payment complaint

How did you overcome your Brexit fallouts with family or friends?

FIVE STORIES.
ZERO NOISE.
EVERY 0600.

Polls open in historic byelection in Makerfield that could determine Keir Starmer’s future – as it happened

Truss the saviour exposes ‘Labour’s secret plan’ | John Crace

Zack Polanski cleared by ethics inquiry over council tax payment complaint

How did you overcome your Brexit fallouts with family or friends?

FIVE STORIES.ZERO NOISE.EVERY 0600.

FIVE STORIES.
ZERO NOISE.
EVERY 0600.