They’re all under 30 and determined to make a difference. Here, five of the youngest candidates tell the BBC why they’re standing in next month’s general election.
Last Thursday, Pedro da Conceição took his final A-level exams, but instead of celebrating with friends, he immediately went back to campaigning.
Pedro, who is running as an independent in West London, is 18 years old and is thought to be the youngest candidate standing in this year’s election.
He had been considering politics as a future career, but it wasn’t until the general election was called at the end of May that he decided to run for parliament.
“When I first told my mother, she thought I was joking,” he says.
Born in Portugal, Pedro moved to the UK with his mother at a young age and says he was motivated to run because of the lack of representation of young people in Parliament.
He credits his mother, an NHS nurse, with inspiring his political activism.
“I watched my mother come to the UK as an immigrant and work really hard,” he says, “and I saw the benefits of immigration and how they can contribute to our economy.”
Image source, Pedro da Conceição
Pedro also wants more investment in public services and efforts to tackle knife crime.
He has seen his peers turn to drugs and gangs to make money to provide for their families, but he says many politicians don’t understand his reality.
“How can we expect someone who is privately educated or who is much older than us to solve problems that we don’t understand?”
It’s difficult to run as an independent without financial backing or the backing of a team.
He funded his candidacy with a £500 deposit (which will be refunded if he receives 5% of the vote) through crowdfunding and using earnings from a part-time job in a restaurant.
He acknowledges his chances of winning Ealing-Southall, a safe Labour seat, are slim.
“But I hope we can inspire more young people to get involved in politics.”
The average age of Diet members has remained around 50 for the past 45 years.
Political journalist Michael Click said that while “there have been young candidates before,” there is a chance that more young candidates will win this time.
He names several Labour candidates in their 20s running in winnable constituencies, and says that if current polls are accurate, we could see a lot of new faces and more turnover in the Labour Party.
This, combined with the retirement of many experienced lawmakers, could result in a lower average age for the new parliament.
Image source, Nathan Roach
Labour candidate Martha O’Neill is hoping to be one of those newcomers. The 26-year-old is standing for a new seat in Wales.
Martha grew up in the former mining town of Ammanford and was raised by her mother after her father died when she was ten.
Her motivation for entering politics was her family’s reliance on state support.
Martha used her education living allowance to buy the books she needed to go to university, won a scholarship to Cambridge University and began working as a civil servant.
She believes young people have a unique perspective they can bring to politics, and that is what she hopes to achieve with Carfildin.
“Ensuring young people’s voices are heard on the platform is crucial to ensuring we have a democracy that is truly representative of the whole of the UK.”
Image source, Conservative Party
Conservative candidate Luke Alan Holmes agrees.
The 21-year-old said most voters were “pleasantly surprised” to see someone his age running for parliament, but some on social media had questioned whether he had the life experience to become an MP.
“I didn’t go to university,” says Luke, who has worked as a cashier at his local Tesco branch and for HM Revenue and Customs. “People need to realise that some young people have actually experienced a lot in life and have a lot to offer.”
Luke grew up in County Durham and said he felt the area was “taken for granted” by Labour politicians.
His secondary school was rated inadequate and had poor public transport, so he had to move near Durham to attend university.
“I saw those challenges firsthand,” he said, “and it inspired me to want to do something about it.”
His interest in politics began after the 2019 general election saw the Conservative Party win a string of former Labour strongholds in the north of England, including nearby Bishop Auckland.
Still, Luke admits he was nervous about running for Durham MP and says since joining the council in 2021 he has experienced harassment both online and in person.
“Some people would call me in the middle of the night,” he said, “or they would approach me on the street and say nasty things.”
“But that’s one of the reasons I want to run, because we need to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
Rebecca Jones, a recent political science graduate running for the Liberal Democrats, says many politicians don’t understand the concerns of young people like her.
To pay her rent, she worked part-time at a cinema while studying, and now, even though she’s working full-time, she says more than 60 percent of her salary goes to housing.
The 21-year-old wants cost of living grants to be reinstated to help students cover living costs and wants measures put in place to address the problem of high rent prices.
She was just 13 when Britain voted to leave the European Union, but her entry into politics was sparked by the impact that Brexit had on young people.
She joined the Liberal Democrats by the age of 16 and handed out leaflets for the party during the 2019 general election.
She plans to run for a local council seat in London in 2022 and in her native Devon the following year.
She was “disappointed” to find out she was 18 votes short of winning, but has decided to stand again, this time to become the MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington.
As a transgender woman, Rebecca is well aware that being out in public can mean she faces abuse, but she’s heartened by the support she’s received from other young people, particularly in the LGBT community.
“Whether it’s 10 votes or 10,000 votes, just knowing that I helped someone become more involved in the democratic process makes every vote count.”
As a local councillor, Ross Clarke has experienced being underestimated because of his age and has also experienced online harassment.
Two years ago, at the age of 21, the sports coaching student was elected to South Lanarkshire Council as the youngest member of the parliament.
“I feel like I have to prove myself a little more to be taken seriously,” Ross said. “I walk into a city hall building and sometimes people assume I’m an intern.”
Now 23 years old, he is standing for the Scottish National Party in the constituency where he has lived all his life.
He first became interested in politics during the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, when he was “infuriated” that he was too young to vote.
But after seeing first-hand what a difference politicians can make to people’s lives as a city councillor, he decided to run for Parliament.
Ross is well aware of the challenges that will await him if he wins Hamilton and Clyde Valley.
He points to the experience of the SNP’s Mhairi Black, who was elected in 2015 at the age of 20, making her the youngest Member of Parliament in 300 years, but is stepping down at the upcoming election.
She blamed social media abuse and a “toxic” working environment at Westminster for the decision.
Despite this, Ross remains determined to give it his all.
“[Young people] They are not only our future, but our present, and they need to be involved in the decision-making process.”
