Stop fighting and work together!

14 October 2014

**Any use of research results in this release must credit Channel 4’s core4 audience insight panel**

16-24 year olds say UK politicians should end their infighting and parties should work together to allow MP’s to do their jobs, a Channel 4 core4 survey has found.

Almost half (48%) think MPs from opposing parties should stop fighting and work together more cohesively to solve the bigger issues – and over a third think ‘more transparency in government’ and ‘less internal conflict within parties’ is needed (40% and 36% respectively).

The new piece of research from Channel 4’s core4 survey was released today to coincide with an exclusive event with Channel 4’s award-winning UK Tribes research panel of16-24s year olds from across the UK which featured a representative sample of its online Tribes Live panel discussing with MPs, campaigners and youth organisations the political issues that most impact on their lives. 

The event, held at Channel4’s Horseferry Road HQ on Tuesday 14th October 2014, also featured guest speaker Secretary of State Nicky Morgan.

The results of the survey, conducted during the period of the party conferences, expose young people’s views on significant political and social issues including employment, benefits, education and immigration. 

 

core4’s survey also found that:

• 20% of 16-24 year olds in the UK would choose not to vote if an election were held tomorrow; 33% would vote for the Labour party; 14% for the Conservative party; 9% for UKIP; and 5% for the Liberal Democrats  
• Focussing on respondents of voting age, 20% of 18-24 year olds would chose not to vote. 33% would vote for the Labour party, followed by the Conservatives (16%) and UKIP and the Liberal Democrats (both 6%)
• Half of 16-24 year olds (51%) think unemployment benefits should be reduced to ensure people cannot earn more money from claiming benefits than they can by going to work
• 51% of the demographic say they have signed a petition in the past, 10% have written to their MP and 9% have participated in a political protest – only a quarter of 16-24 year olds say they have no interest in politics at all
• Over two thirds are most concerned about jobs and unemployment, with 68% noting these as the most important to them
• TV remains the number one medium for informing 16-24s about current affairs

Channel 4 has a unique relationship with young people - it is the only UK public service broadcaster whose channels are watched more by young people than the overall population. In 2013, Channel 4 programmes accounted for 60% of the most watched documentary, factual and current affairs shows by 16-34 year olds.  

Channel 4 harnesses this relationship through viewer engagement tools such as core4, UK Tribes and Tribes Live to provide unique understanding and insights into the attitudes and behaviour of this often elusive demographic.

The broadcaster now has over 11 million registered viewers - including half of all 16-34 year olds in the UK - and has fused this growing viewer database with its leading UK Tribes research resource of engaged 16-24 year olds to create Tribes Live (in partnership with Crowd DNA), its real-time, always online panel of young people. Together, this valuable resource delivers an on-going powerful combination of on-demand viewing behaviour and qualitative, bespoke insight to both Channel 4 and its commercial partners, telling the story about young people in 2014 and beyond.

Ends.

 

Notes to editors

• The core4 research is based on a nationally representative sample of 319 16-24 year old respondents