Grey Power or Youth-Quake? Stephen Lambert considers whether the old lost the election for Corbyn or the young for May.

FOR DECADES it has been believed that social class was the key determinant behind the outcome of a general election. The shock result of the Conservative Party failing to achieve an outright majority with Jeremy Corbyn's left-centre Labour Party hot on its heels has demolished this notion.

On June 8, 2017, with a turnout of 69%, Theresa May's Conservative Party got 42% of the popular vote with Labour getting 40%. Sociologically, the Conservative Party has managed to get support of huge section of the professional and white-collar middle classes with Labour getting the support of the blue-collar working-class. Class dealignment finally came of age last June. For the political scientist Robert Ford, age has now overtaken class, to become the key cleavage in British politics.

Labour, the party of working people and their families, with an emphasis on wealth redistribution from the well-to-do to those on modest incomes, gained increased support in 2017 in seats with huge concentrations of middle class professionals. The Tories, the party of big business and 'Middle-England', made significant gains in the poorest seats. The richest constituency, Kensington, went Labour for the first time while the former working-class mining seat Mansfield went Conservative on a staggering 18% swing. Even Bishop Auckland in County Durham, a Labour stronghold since 1935, narrowly escaped becoming a Conservative gain by a tiny 500 odd votes!

''Age Apartheid'' with a generational divide in voting habits and political attitudes has become a feature of Brexit Britain. For Stephen Burke, director of the influential think tank, United for All Ages, ''Britain is increasingly divided by age and generation.'' The UK has an ageing population. In 2016 the over-65s numbered 12 million exceeding the number of those under 18.

There's a dominant perspective that the UK's elderly carry significant political weight; the so-called 'grey power'. It's also broadly the case that the older a person gets, the more likely they are to vote. Turnout amongst the over-55s was 75% in the 2015 election (down by 2% in 2017) compared to a 43% turnout amongst the 18 to 24 age group - though turnout amongst the young did increase to 54% in the 2017 election.

There's a tendency for younger people to vote Labour and older people to vote Conservative. In 2017, according to the highly respected pollster, professor John Curtis two thirds of the 18 to 24-year group backed Labour with six out 10 pensioners supporting the Conservative Party. In 1974 David Butler (now 92), the elections guru, wrote of 'senescent Conservatism', the idea that the more senile you become, the more likely you are to become a Conservative!

Amongst political sociologists there remains a debate as to why this is. Some researchers argue that older people are more conservative with a small 'c' - more committed to traditional norms and values. Amongst older people there's more support for the Conservative Party, perhaps reflecting a more restrained view on issues of personal morality, drugs, membership of the EU, immigration and sexual orientation. This may be related to a political upbringing formed by age-generational experiences during their formative years. Others have suggested that as people get older they become more cynical about social change at home and abroad. Most have mortgages to pay off plus other costs to do with family responsibilities. Survey evidence indicates that many are disconcerted by high taxation to fund public services. Once their finances are more secure in their 60s they may resent having to pay more for social welfare for other age groups.

At the other end of the age spectrum, young people are more radical, and more open to change and new policy ideas. As revealed in the 2017 election they they tended to see Labour as closer to their world view. In the last half decade economic opportunities for young adults have shrunk. Dubbed ''generation rent'', many find it hard to get on to the housing ladder. Their wages have been hit hard by austerity. Housing benefits have been cut as pensioner allowances have increased. As the educationalist Patrick Ainley notes, many young graduates end up in non-graduate jobs.

Labour's social democratic manifesto promises, spearheaded by the left-wing social movement Momentum, via social media, to abolish university fees, restore grants for further education students, the living wage of ￡10, more affordable social housing and tackling mental ill-health resonated with millions of middle and working-class young people. Little wonder they came out in their droves for Jeremy Corbyn who helped to restore trust in the political process.

Until June millions didn't vote. Some researchers saw them as cut off from electoral politics - alienated, because of cynical MPs, spin-doctors, fake news and some politician's focus on the negative aspects of youth. Corbin's perceived authenticity and integrity helped to re-connect the country's youth to active civic participation. Parliamentary seats with large student populations swung to Labour by 6%. In Brighton, Hove, Canterbury, Plymouth and Portsmouth, Labour's share of the vote soared by between 16 to 21 percentage points. In university constituencies like Newcastle, Durham, York and Leeds Labour piled up votes in already safe seats while the party took the affluent Sheffield Hallam seat from former Lib-Dem leader Nick Clegg!

There was scant difference in constituencies with big elderly populations like Suffolk and along the south coast which stayed loyal to the Conservatives. When it comes to voting, the generation gap has got wider than ever before. For Britain's two dominant parties the future challenges are great. For the Tories to win convincingly they need to win over over the youth vote. For Labour, despite promises to retain the triple lock and winter fuel allowances, they need to win over the hearts and minds of the nation's older voters (50 plus) in order to achieve modest success at the ballot box.

On a broader societal level, more needs to be done to challenge intergenerational inequality with bold public policies to promote greater integration between older and younger citizens. As Stephen Burke concludes: ''Ending age apartheid and promoting social integration between generations can help build communities and a country for all ages, where we're united not divided.'' In Brexit Britain, surely that's a goal worth pursuing in 2017 and beyond.

This article in various formats appeared in Labour List, Labour Vision and The Journal.