Turning Point UK was destined to fail. Here's why

The arrival of Turning Point UK (TPUK), a British offshoot of the American right-wing youth pressure group has, all things considered, caused something of a ruckus. Ever since Momentum burst to prominence at the last general election, politicos have been waiting to see if a similar youth-inspired group would spring up from the right. You can understand why; a balanced playing field for the left and right of massive youth enthusiasm is what many of us have wanted to see for as long as we can remember. Something, anything to suggest to us that the old tropes about foolish children being left wing, or people under 30 being essentially apathetic towards politics, aren’t true.

Sadly, TPUK is not the answer. TPUSA was an organisation that sprung up in the aftermath of Donald Trump’s presidential victory. It modelled itself around issues of free speech, campus censorship, and the notion that conservative thought is being aggressively assaulted. That might have worked in the US, where campuses are often overtly left wing and protests against conservatives frequently turn violent (and that was the case before the Antifa phenomenon or Black Lives Matter movement even went mainstream). But in the UK, although universities are also dominated by left-wing academics and censorship is creeping ever more insidiously, the violence just isn’t there. And though one may make the argument for not wanting to let things get to that stage, it will be difficult to motivate or mobilise people without the threat of violence there.

For those interested in opposing group think or campus censorship, organisations and publications already exist – most notably the magazine Spiked Online. The market, as it were, has already been cornered.

But for those students who care about more than free speech, for whom conservatism is more central to their ideology than the right to mouth off, the search for a youth movement is even harder. There have been several efforts to rouse the blue ranks (who remembers Activate and the invite-only Tory Glastonbury?) but it has never worked.

There are several reasons for this, the chief among them, perhaps, is psychological. Young people are, by and large, poor, with little power beyond what their parents or the state lend them. Indeed, they have only recently ceased being the legal wards of their parents. An ideology, then, that rails against a sense of injustice makes more sense than one that favours responsibility. Up to a point, Libertarianism appeals to this sense of injustice too, but in reality, the young people drawn to it tend to be more empowered than most. Therefore, the appeal is limited.

Then, of course, there is the clash between conservatism and libertarianism that few have yet bridged. Sadly for TPUK, there is no Libertarian party in the UK. Sure, there is a streak in the Tory party, but you could hardly say it was winning.

Right of centre youth movements in this country are also tainted by tragedy. Ruthless ambition is rife in any political movement – but in the conservative movement it is particularly difficult to mask it. Blame our class-based culture, or the nature of politics more generally, but there is little question that the junior ranks of the political right aren’t exactly an inviting place to those looking in from the outside. That’s no way to encourage a youth movement.

Moreover, TPUK lacks its Trump (or, if you will, its Corbyn). There is no quasi-messianic leader figure to rally round, nor is there the prospect of one emerging any time soon. Sure, there are many (very, very many) who fancy themselves capable, but the fact that no one has risen to the fore sooner tells its own story. In our era, the only right-leaning figures with the charisma of a Trump are Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage. Frankly, that tells you all you need to know.

TPUK is an American group entering a world that is, even now, completely different to the one it left behind stateside. The cultural and social divides it seeks to unite are even more disparate. Sure, it has the money to stick around for a while, but the kids aren’t in Kansas anymore.

If conservatives are to win round young voters of the future, they will have to do so by policy. That means an extensive, market-led house-building programme, and a re-think on education. It doesn’t mean trying to ape Labour and their Momentum acolytes; conservatives must try to act like a party of government, not a university politics society gone rogue.