Faisal Islam, Political Editor

On election night some Cabinet ministers saw thousands of young people come out to vote against them personally, crushing their super-safe majorities into marginal territory.

They, above all, must be thankful for the failure of most polling, in misdirecting Labour HQ's attack efforts, away from their seats.

The Tory approach so far is that this is a one-off - a freakish mania afflicting bribed young people conned by Corbyn, which will soon simmer down.

I contend that this is totally wrong.


Image: Corbyn-mania gripped crowds at Glastonbury this year

This is just the most visible manifestation of a wave of young and middle aged voters, whose rather different values, ill-suited to right-left spectrum, will reshape British politics in the next decade and beyond.

It is the people born in 1970s and 1980s Britain, the house music Hacienda Generation.

The Conservatives have had the appearance of traction after forcing Jeremy Corbyn to account for vague non-manifesto promises on "dealing with" student debt.

The relative success of that attack, compared with the post election mayhem, is more dangerous for the Conservatives than it is for Labour.

Theresa May's lack of majority was not down to a deficit of supportive Daily Mail front pages.

The Conservatives problem with younger voters is very real, and will soon become fundamental, and perhaps even existential.

Some airily talk of ensuring that the next election does not take place during term time. Labour are well alive to this, and would not agree to an election date that was aimed at youth vote disenfranchisement.

The Conservatives problem with younger voters is very real, and will soon become fundamental, and perhaps even existential.

Others think the young voters can be turned by suggesting that Corbyn has betrayed them over student debt, or that he made a shameless bribe of "free stuff" to politically unsophisticated youth.

It may comfort CCHQ strategists, but it is dangerously delusional.

By youth, we are now talking not about students, but effectively across the whole gamut of the under-45s, the Conservatives no longer lead. This includes some people in good jobs, paying lots of tax.

There was a moment for the Conservatives, under David Cameron, when they won more thirtysomethings than Labour.

According to the YouGov post election poll in 2015, 36% of voters in their 30s voted Conservative, against 34% for Labour under Ed Miliband. The same pollster had that figure at an incredible 55% for Labour and 29% for the Conservatives in 2017.

What could possibly have led to such a huge swing in just two years?

Jeremy Corbyn supporters will say it is the Labour leader. Conservatives say tuition fees. But the bigger factor is clearly the issue the PM said she fought the election on - Brexit.

The Conservatives saw the largest swings against them in Remain majority areas, such as all the way along the M4 motorway from London to Bristol and Cardiff. Between 60 and 75% of under 45s voted Remain.

The fact is, young and middle-aged voters were outvoted by older voters in the Brexit vote in 2016. The demographics are going in only one direction now though. Add the two factors together and you get a picture of an older generation forcing its vision of the future on the young.

There is a subtlety here too. The fact is, young and middle-aged voters were outvoted by older voters in the Brexit vote in 2016. The demographics are going in only one direction now though.

Add the two factors together and you get a picture of an older generation forcing its vision of the future on the young.

Indeed no one needs to change their mind about Brexit for the Leave majority to erode even by the time of the next election.

The response to all of this could have been a compromise form of Brexit, a compact between the generations.

Instead Mrs May sought confirmation and an extension of her mandate for a rather uncompromising form of Brexit.

Her manifesto sought almost to enforce compliance of the under-45s into the most uncompromising interpretation of older voters' vision for the country. She and her party lost seats.

The perception of this alone is a considerably new factor in British culture.

Generational compromise is baked into our political and economic system.

A Pay as You Go pension system is a contract between generations worth hundreds of billions of pounds.

Image: Young anti-Brexit protesters protest near Downing Street after the UK voted to leave the EU

A far larger proportion of under-45s voted for David Cameron and some pretty explicit fiscal incentives for their elders, from austerity-exempt pensions, to free bus passes and the extraordinary special offer of higher interest rates for pensioner bonds timed for the 2015 General Election.

Measured public opinion will now until the next election reflect a majority of votes going to left-centre parties, unlike in 2015. Effectively the higher 2017 turnout in younger generations is now baked into the political discourse.

It raises the stakes considerably.

At the time of the Lancaster House speech Leavers may have anticipated a collapsing EU with a weaker economy and a strengthened domestic negotiation hand helping with a "cleaning up operation" of Remainers.

In that time, however, the UK economy has become the weakest in Europe, the EU has strengthened itself in a series of elections partly as a reaction to Brexit, and Mrs May lost her majority on an election she fought expressly to strengthen her Brexit mandate.

More than that though, at some point the 1970s/80s-born generation will, to coin a phrase, "take back control".

Very socially liberal, internationalist and savvy sceptics of repetitive unconvincing marketing messages and newspaper editorials. Pro-entrepreneur but not axiomatically pro-free market. What Brexit actually triggered was the awareness of the power of political participation.

Essentially, Brexit brought US-style culture wars to the UK.

The election was a chance to settle a winner. Surely now, the only possible solution for political parties which wish to thrive, is a compromise.

Sky Views is a series of comment pieces by Sky News editors and correspondents, published every morning.

Previously on Sky Views: Alistair Bunkall - UK military avoiding awkward questions