When Britons go to the polls next month, the results will likely reveal just how un-United the Kingdom has become. Separatist parties are poised to win in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. The established parties of government – Labour and Conservative – are likely to sustain losses. The former may be deserved, and the latter unjust, given Kemi Badenoch has been vigorously effective in holding the Prime Minister to account. Even so, the polarising dynamics of our splintered nation will hit both historic parties hard.

In a polity that is split by geography, attitude and income, one division is particularly striking: age

In a polity that is split by geography, attitude and income, one division is particularly striking: age. Intergenerational tensions are one of Britain’s most salient divisions. A YouGov poll following the Gorton and Denton by-election found almost half of 18- to 24-year-olds back Zack Polanski’s Greens compared with only 6 per cent of those over 65. By contrast, a majority of over-50s support the Tories or Reform, rising to almost two-thirds of over-65s. Eric Kaufmann, the political scientist, has highlighted how socially liberal young voters diverge from their more conservative elders on everything from trans rights to environmental action.

The young have always been attracted to radicalism. But the Green surge, and the wider alienation of younger voters from democratic capitalism, is now a serious problem in British politics. It is sustained, and exacerbated, by fundamental economic injustices. For voters under 35, stagnant growth and thwarted opportunities are all they have ever known. The legacy of the financial crash, the consequences of quantitative easing, the scarring of the Covid pandemic and the impact of mass immigration have squeezed them economically. Those with assets have grown richer, those with ambition have seen their future horizons narrowed.

Today’s young find that their housing is far more expensive than that of their parents’, their taxes are only going up and, perhaps most unfairly of all, they are saddled with debt for degrees they were urged to get but which haven’t brought the promised returns. Meanwhile, a quarter of pensioners are millionaires; over-55s are around seven times more likely to own their home than those under 30; the lucky few who have bought in the capital are now victims of the price crash that is investigated by John Power. When Polanski says the system is rigged, the young can’t disagree.

The most egregious way that the system is tilted in favour of the old is the triple lock, which ensures pensions rise in line with wages, inflation or 2.5 per cent, whichever is highest. For Robert Jenrick, Reform’s Treasury spokesman, the policy means ‘standing by pensioners’ who have ‘paid in all their lives’. A noble sentiment, perhaps, but neither an accurate description of how pensions work nor a cheap commitment to make. State pensions are paid out of today’s tax receipts, not previous contributions. By 2030, state pensions will cost £15.5 billion more than if they had only risen with earnings. Since 2011, the state pension has increased by 80 per cent, far above wage growth over the same period. The number of younger taxpayers isn’t growing fast enough to sustain this unprecedentedly wealthy pensioner class.

If the pensions triple lock were scrapped, then tax revenues could be diverted to other areas, defence perhaps, or science. But a more direct way of helping younger voters would be to use the funds to relieve them of the usurious interest rates levied on student loans. The billions saved by scrapping the triple lock would eliminate the interest rate escalator on student loans and relieve young voters of a Sisyphean debt.

Badenoch is the leader who has done most to highlight the unfairness of the current student loan system. Committing to a student debt jubilee signals that the Conservatives are willing to make hard choices to help the young, just as Reform panders to the grey vote. Badenoch grasps that any sustainable majority must rely on winning both the young and old – as Margaret Thatcher did in 1979. Her plan to abolish stamp duty is in this mould – helping older homeowners too by reducing the cost of downsizing.

Failing to bridge the generational divide would leave Britain split into two nations, as Benjamin Disraeli said of the rich and the poor, ‘between whom there is no intercourse and no sympathy; who are as ignorant of each other’s habits, thoughts, and feelings, as if they were dwellers in different zones, or inhabitants of different planets; who are formed by a different breeding, are fed by a different food, are ordered by different manners, and are not governed by the same laws’. Farage’s Britain, against Polanski’s, to the ultimate benefit of none.