Whatever happened to the Young Conservatives?

In 1949, the Young Conservatives boasted 160,000 members. They were the largest political youth organisation in the free world. Their social events were iconic and thousands of marriages, it was said, had been formed after encounters at Young Conservative committee meetings or balls. But by the mid-1960s, the organisation was declining; by the 1980s, it was in freefall. So what happened to the Young Conservatives? And can the Tories, or any other party, engage young people once again as members?In this episode, the following books are mentioned:'Planes, Trains and Toilet Doors' by Matt Chorley. Available at: https://amzn.to/4gJ10of'Ruling the Void: The Hollowing of Western Democacy' by Peter Mair. Available at: https://amzn.to/4gEUv5P***Since Attlee & Churchill is a podcast about post-war British politics - since Attlee & Churchill - and is hosted by Lee David Evans, an historian of the Conservative Party, and Richard Johnson, an historian of the Labour Party. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.