The Rock Blog

Eamonn Hurley-Flynn is the ‘Caerulean’ editor (monthly publication from UCL CF).

When the impartial observer examines the current state of Conservative Future it outwardly appears as though its importance is steadily dwindling – numbers are declining, campaigning activity is scattered and to some extent it can still be viewed as the last refuge of the young ‘Tory Boy.’ ‘Young Conservatives’ claimed membership numbers at their height of 250,000. This is clearly a stark and initially worrying contrast to the current 15,000 of Conservative Future. Many people would suggest that these numbers are indicative of a terminal decline for such youth organisations but there are a number of issues that need to be addressed before any conclusions are to be drawn.

Firstly, although Young Conservatives claimed 250,000 members, a large proportion of them were not there when it came to campaigning and other such activities. The numbers that turned out were undoubtedly far higher than the entire body of CF today but nevertheless they were not all out there when they could have been. This makes for interesting analysis. What seems to be the case is that, despite increasing voter apathy amongst the general youth population, a far higher proportion of the current CF members are willing to go out campaigning, provided that there is sufficient organisation of campaign days. This puts out a far more positive message than the Young Conservatives used to do. With the appropriate management, CF needn’t have the hedonistic, reckless image which turned out to be the source of Young Conservatives demise throughout the 1980s and 1990s.

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