University entry rates show shifting sands of UK politics

The average higher education entry rate for Labour-supporting areas of the UK has shot up significantly in the 14 years since the party last held power, analysis suggests, as it has become increasingly popular among graduates in big cities.

With more bad news for the Conservative government at the local elections, Times Higher Education analysed recent figures from admissions service Ucas to examine how shifting demographics and political trends have changed the major parties’ core support bases.

The figures show that an average of 35 per cent of adults across the Conservatives’ 345 political constituencies had been to university in 2023 – up 6.5 percentage points from 2010, when they came into power through a coalition.

But over the same time frame, Labour’s average entry rate has increased much more – from just 25.5 per cent to 37 per cent – and has now overtaken the Conservatives.

Justin Fisher, professor of political science at Brunel University London, said educational attainment had become a much bigger driver of electoral preferences than social class.

“Broadly speaking, where people are more educated, they are more likely to vote for left and centre-left parties in the UK,” he said.

“That’s likely to accelerate or harden the divisions in terms of electoral behaviour between Tory seats where there’s lower level of higher education and Labour seats where there’s much more.”

The average Liberal Democrat seat also improved quicker than the Conservatives’, from 32.7 per cent in 2010 to 41.1 per cent in 2023.

Professor Fisher said former prime minister Boris Johnson was able to win seats across “Red Wall” areas which would have tended to have lower entry rates and fewer graduates in his sweeping victory in 2019.

But another reason why Labour seats have overtaken the Conservatives in this metric is because of its own shifting electoral base.

“The Labour vote has been increasingly concentrated in big cities, which is where you tend to get graduates, and graduates breed graduates, so it’s likely to be a reflection as much as a cause,” said Professor Fisher.

“Longer term, if those trends continue, then you would expect the accentuation between those graduates and non-graduate voters to be hardened.”

THE’s analysis showed that entry rates in Conservative-held seats were twice as likely to have failed to improve as in Labour areas. Since 2010, the entry rates did not improve in 10.1 per cent of Conservative seats, but this was the case for only 4.9 per cent of Labour’s seats.

Over that time, the constituency of Hammersmith was the fastest improving, with its entry rate more than doubling, from 26.4 per cent to 56.9 per cent. Of the top 25 most improved areas, which were largely city areas, only one was currently held by a Conservative.

Stuart Wilks-Heeg, professor of politics at the University of Liverpool, said part of the Conservative appeal to many voters in 2019 was the promise of “levelling up”, with education and training being central to that agenda – albeit with the emphasis on non-university routes, post-18.

“It's fair to say that little progress has been made here and that most of these constituencies can be expected to swing back to Labour at the forthcoming election,” he added.

While the student vote was not expected to have a significant impact at the next general election, Professor Wilks-Heeg said higher education could become a significant issue at the election – though one with much less traction than schools or the NHS.

“The developing financial crisis in the sector could potentially emerge as an election issue where redundancies and departmental closures are impacting current students and, by extension, their parents.”

patrick.jack@timeshighereducation.com