While the 2024 General Election delivered a landslide victory for Labour for the first time since 1997, there is a ‘but’ that has gone under the radar in much of the reporting: voter turnout was historically low.
In fact, turnout was just 60%. This is right down there alongside other record low turnout elections – 2001’s 59% and 1918’s 57% – and quite some distance from 1950s’ record high 84%. This is despite reminders to vote coming from more directions than ever, with apps including Facebook, Instagram, and Spotify sending notifications to people to register to vote, and TikTok launching a ‘UK General Election Centre’. Kiss FM launched the podcast, The Turnout, with social media influence GK Barry, on how to drive up turnout amongst young people. All, seemingly, to little avail.
Combining this low turnout with the widely acknowledged First-Past-The-Post mismatch between vote share and seat return – means that only 20% of the eligible UK population voted for the party that now has 63% of the seats in the House of Commons. This compares to 2019 where turnout was 67%, meaning 30% of the eligible UK population returned 56% of the seats in the House of Commons for the Conservative party. There is a question here around the democratic legitimacy of sweeping political change that, on 4 July, only around one in five people voted for.
This isn’t only a national challenge, but a question of how people relate to the places they live, and whether or not they feel they have the power to participate in the democratic process locally.
Here at the Institute for Community Studies at The Young Foundation, we are strong believers that better outcomes are achieved when communities are able to participate in democratic processes.
This appears to be a sentiment Labour shares, with ‘hand back power to communities’ being one of ten key take-aways the Government wanted to highlight from the King’s Speech. And with Angela Rayner, Deputy Prime Minister and Secretary of State for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, promising a ‘devolution revolution’, and saying she wants to give ‘local leaders… along with their local citizens, a bigger say on how to transform their neighbourhoods and high streets’.
Feeling willing and able to vote at general elections is one of the most fundamental building blocks of our political system in the UK and a critical question to explore if we are to improve the overall health of our democracy.
This is therefore a moment to take a deep dive into voter turnout at a constituency level, mapping turnout across the UK, and highlighting some place-based trends, illustrated by new data.
Map 1. Voter Turnout at constituency level for the 2024 General Election, mapped by Jack Layton.
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Highest turnouts
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Lowest turnouts
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Old Bexley and Sidcup
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79%
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Manchester Rusholme
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40%
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South Northamptonshire
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76%
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Leeds South
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42%
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Bexleyheath and Crayford
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76%
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Kingston upon Hull East
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42%
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Harpenden and Berkhamsted
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75%
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Blaenau Gwent and Rhymney
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43%
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Rushcliffe
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73%
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Tipton and Wednesbury
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43%
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Winchester
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73%
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Wolverhampton South East
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43%
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Esher and Walton
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73%
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Blackley and Middleton South
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43%
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Chesham and Amersham
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73%
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Birmingham Ladywood
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44%
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South Cotswolds
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73%
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Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North
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44%
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North Somerset
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72%
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Birmingham Erdington
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44%
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Table 1. UK constituencies with the highest and lowest turnouts.
What the 2024 turnout data shows
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Higher turnout in suburban and rural areas. A clear pattern illustrated by the map is that there was consistently higher turnout in suburban and rural areas – particularly in the South of England, with a cluster of seats with the highest turnouts towards the South-west of London.
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Low turnout in major urban areas. The map indicates a number of clear ‘cold spots’, including Birmingham (49%), Wolverhampton (49%), Leeds (54%), Manchester (49%), and Greater London (59%). A number of factors could be at play here. This could be an ongoing effect of the Israel Gaza conflict, that have left many feeling disconnected with the political process. There could also be logistical reasons, such as the challenges of getting to the polling booth in major urban areas, with people managing competing pressures on their time with shift work and caring responsibilities – for example electoral registration is high among disabled citizens, yet they have lower levels of participation than their non-disabled counterparts. As a recent report from the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POST) has summarised – there is a wealth of literature on how socio-economic background, ethnic identity, and wider political disengagement can lead to low turnout.
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Large coastal towns and cities in the north of England also had low turnout. Middlesborough (50%), Blackpool (51%), Hull (48%), and Grimsby (48%) all stand out on the map as having areas of low turnout. These are areas that in many ways were at the forefront of the Conservatives’ ‘Levelling Up’ agenda – post-industrial towns that are struggling economically. Once, traditional Labour strongholds, it seems as if these kinds of places are simply opting not to vote.
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Strong turnout for progressive platforms. On average, Reform UK won in seats with an average 56% turnout – even their party leader, Nigel Farage, was only elected in a seat with 59% turnout. In comparison, in the seats that the Green party won, average turnout was 69%. One reading is that there is an audience for the message of change – particularly change that prioritises climate action.
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There are rewards for campaigning locally. On average, turnout in Conservative-won seats was 64%. Notably, Jeremy Hunt – who focused on constituency campaigning over national campaigning – was re-elected in Godalming and Ash, where the turnout was 72%. Similarly, in Islington North, Jeremy Corbyn was re-elected in a seat with 67% turnout (higher than the national average, 60%; and higher than the Greater London average, 59%), whereas Sir Keir Starmer – whose campaign necessarily focused on Labour’s national agenda – was re-elected in Holborn and St Pancras with a lower turnout of 54%.
What affects a person’s willingness and ability to vote?
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Why did so many living in major urban areas, coastal towns and cities decide not to turnout for this election? These places represent a significant portion of the UK population. It will be important to understand what it is about these locations that means people did not turn out to vote.
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What are the enabling conditions for democratic participation? There were pockets of high turnout across the UK. Just as important as understanding why people didn’t turnout, it is critical to understand what it is about these places that mean people feel willing and able to turn out to vote. This likely isn’t just about sentiment, but also pragmatic questions of public transport, and the availability of civic infrastructure that makes it easier to participate.
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How can democratic engagement become a straightforward and routine part of people’s everyday lives? The trends in major urban areas suggests there are persistent barriers for people turning up to vote in busy, densely populated cities. This is all the more important in the context of data from the ONS highlighting 57% of people have low or no trust in UK Government.
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How are 16- and –17-year-olds feeling? It is worth noting that the analysis included here only involves people aged 18 plus. If the UK is serious about increasing democratic participation, then extending the vote to 16- and 17-year-olds could be a consideration for this Labour government. We have a sense of how that might look: 23,000 young people recently cast their vote in a mass-scale proxy election across England and Wales. The result put Labour on 32%, the green at 29%. As analysis by IPPR has highlighted – turnout appears to be higher in constituencies where there is a higher proportion of people aged over 65. Thinking carefully about the barriers and enablers to youth turnout could be critical for raising turnout as a whole.
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How can a robust decarbonisation agenda accelerate change? The results of the Greens in generating above average turnout suggests that there is appetite for being able to vote for action on climate change. Taking a place-based approach in responding to climate change might be one way to make people feel as if they have a vested interest in their local political outcomes.
How can we increase voter turnout in general elections?
There is an opportunity to rewrite the rulebook in how democratic engagement and participation happens across the UK. We believe should urgently launch a green public participation strategy, which will inform policy priorities across government departments, including housing, employment, education and other areas.
Alongside this, the Government may commission an investigation into voter turnout, to improve our understanding of the local conditions that draw (or deter) people to their local polling stations. This might prompt target-setting for raising participation – for example, perhaps seeking to increase turnout by 10% in every single constituency in the next General Election.
We also see a need to build whole-society preparedness, supporting communities to adapt to future shocks, whether local or national, and however caused. This can be done through mandating that community participation is embedded into Local Resilience Forums.
These straightforward steps could help support the overall health of our democracy and give more people in more locations the power to participate.