Interface will help users choose whether home or university most favourable place for Labour victory

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Momentum is launching a new digital tool for students to decide whether to vote at university or at home in an effort to drive up the Labour vote in marginal seas.

Boris Johnson’s Uxbridge and South Ruislip seat – home to students of Brunel University London – will be targeted by the campaign group who believe they can overturn the prime minister’s 5,000-strong majority.

The new tool will allow students to put in both their home and university postcodes and will indicate which location will ultimately be more advantageous to register to vote in order to enable a Labour victory.

The technology, developed by volunteer coders, follows Momentum’s popular My Nearest Marginal website which helped activists get out and campaign in key seats at the 2017 general election.

Laura Parker, Momentum’s national coordinator, said: “Young people surged to Labour in the last election because we offered a concrete vision of hope.

“They turned seats like Canterbury and Newcastle-under-Lyme red, and we’re going to register tens of thousands of young people in key marginals to make sure they’re part of the movement against this government which treats them with such contempt.”

The organisation also plans to spend thousands of pounds on Facebook adverts targeting young Labour voters in marginals. They will also attend university freshers fairs to explain how to register to vote.

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There are five target seats with a sitting Tory MP and high youth populations on which Momentum are keen to focus. They have worked out that if 19,000 young voters register across the seats of Walsall North, Truro and Falmouth, Uxbridge and South Ruislip, Loughborough and Cities of London and Westminster, they could all switch to Labour.

They also want to protect Labour marginals that have large youth populations but majorities smaller than 1,600.

This includes Kensington, which is held by Labour with a majority of just 20, Lincoln, Newcastle-under-Lyme, Portsmouth South, Warwick and Leamington, and Canterbury. All of these seats typically have a university or a large further education college in the constituency.

Thousands of people are understood to have registered to vote since the prorogation of parliament. Momentum’s drive to ensure students are signed up was sparked in part over fears the Tories were trying to hold an election on a date that would have made it very difficult for students to register to vote in time.

The Times reported how Boris Johnson’s election campaign team had factored in that an 15 October polling date would have restricted the number of students registering to vote as many would be moving house and may not be able to provide an address until the registration date had passed.

According to the newspaper, No 10 believed if students remained registered at their home address, they would have been less inclined to vote when election day came around.

Parker said: “Johnson’s attempt to rig the election and stop students from registering is deplorable, and it’s heartening to see so many young people getting registered in response.”

Labour is far more popular among students than any other political party according to polls, although this summer the party hit a four-year low in support from students.

At the next election, Johnson is facing a challenge from 24-year-old Labour candidate Ali Milani and also Liberal Democrat Elizabeth Evenden-Kenyon.