What do young Scots make of General Election 2024?

Barnaby Papadopulos spoke to pupils at schools in the south of Scotland ahead of the vote.

Pupils at schools in the south of Scotland have spoken about their views on the General Election 2024 in a series of wide-ranging interviews with ITV News Border.

Twelve students at St Joseph's College in Dumfries and Stranraer Academy spoke about political leadership, the state of the campaign, and the policies being offered that could affect their futures.

The 16 and 17-year-olds interviewed won't get a vote on 4 July 2024 but were keen to have their say.

Zack, from St Joseph's College, felt like he couldn't trust the promises made by politicians. "It's a recurring theme," he said.

"They like to make promises that sound good at the time, but then maybe they haven't done the numbers, or they don't know if they can actually carry them through."

Trust was an issue for other students too. "I wouldn't say I trust them really," said one. "They are making quite a lot of empty promises."

"I think a lot of them are making promises for votes," said 17-year-old Hannah. "Maybe they're not going to fulfil them."

Most of the students who spoke to ITV News are accessing the majority of their General Election news through TikTok.

They spoke about seeing videos from political parties which usually focused on 'trolling' their opponents, rather than explaining their policies.

They were divided on whether this was a healthy, helpful, form of campaigning.

"Because it's such short-form content there's hardly any nuance to it, and I think young teenagers are just getting presented with 'the Tories are awful' or 'Labour are awful,' and they're not having any nuance or proper political discussion," said one pupil.

Another argued the format was helping get younger people interested in current affairs. "It's good to get younger people more engaged with politics," he said.

When it came to issues, it was the cost of living crisis, public services, and the state of the economy which sat at the forefront of pupil's minds.

In Stranraer, which has been cut off from the rest of the region by rail for months, one student said they felt 'trapped.'

"There's no trains, the buses can take hours, up to four hours to get to Glasgow. The cost of fuel is so expensive, the roads are dangerously unsafe."

"Probably about half our year don't have jobs," said another. "There's such minimal places to go."

"It's just lack of funding," said Sophie. "If you look at Dumfries, it's just an hour or two down the road but they've got so much more than us. We've only got two clothes shops, so if you want to shop you've got to shop online so we can't help the local businesses."

The Stranraer pupils said that lots of shops had been closed down in recent years, with proprietors unable to afford their rent.

One student said the cost of living had even hit their school: "It's all around you, it's on TikTok, it's on the news, it's everywhere. And you start to think, I have noticed that. Even the school dinner prices in the cafeteria went up."

Parties have been making manifesto pledges which would have a major impact on these future voters.

The Conservative Party has promised to reintroduce a form of national service, which would see the majority of 18-year-olds undertake twenty-five days of volunteering a year whilst a small number would take part in a year-long placement with the armed forces.

National Service was universally unpopular among the pupils we spoke to, with several students suggesting it was a policy designed to appeal to older voters.

"I really don't think there are many people that would support that," said one student. "Apart from some maybe older Conservative voters."

Meanwhile, Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens all want to introduce votes at 16 in general elections.

Among the Scottish students, who already got a vote in Scottish Parliamentary elections, there was general approval of the idea.

"If I've got the right to get married, if I can drive, if I can pay tax, if I can do all these things, why can't I vote?" said Hannah from Dumfries.

"It would be a good thing to have for me personally," said another. "I think the majority of 16 and 17-year-olds aren't that passionate about getting a vote."

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