On 18 October 2019, the UK electoral commission published the definitive numbers of registered voters and voters in the United Kingdom for the European Elections 2019. With this publication all 28 EU Member States have officially announced their final national turnout data, settling the official final turnout at European level at 50.66% (+8.06 pp compared to 2014).

The 2019 European elections were shaped by the significant increase in voter turnout. 50.66% is in fact the highest turnout since 1994 European elections and a striking increase by 8.06 percentage points from 2014 (when the turnout was 42.60%).

20 Member States reported increase in national turnout, with significant increases compared to 2014 recorded in Poland, Romania, Spain, Austria, Hungary and Germany. Also countries with a traditional low or very low turnout in European elections, such as Slovakia and Czechia, showed substantial increases. On the other hand, turnout decreased in eight countries, but by no more than 3 percentage points in any of them. Despite the average increase in turnout, large differences remain between Member States, ranging from 88.47% in Belgium to 22.74% in Slovakia.

You can find all final data on the results website.

Youth participation

Socio-demographic analysis shows that there has been an increase in turnout for all groups of the population, although this is higher for some groups, with a much larger turnout among younger people and first-time voters. Although older people remain more likely to vote, the increase between 2014 and 2019 is larger among young people aged under 25 (42%, +14 pp) and aged 25–39 (47%, +12pp), when compared with those aged 55 or over (54%, +3 pp). Overall, this means that the differences between age groups have narrowed when comparing 2019 with 2014 (see page 24 of the report).

Reasons for voting

A greater sense of civic duty boosted the overall turnout, alongside increasingly positive support for the EU and its impact on Europeans.

The most common reason for voting was because people felt it was their duty as a citizen (52%). Other main reasons were because the respondent always votes (35%), because they are in favour of the EU (25%), to support the political party they feel close to (22%) and because voting in the elections can ‘make things change’ (18%) (see page 44 of the report).

Issues behind the vote

There are five issues mentioned by at least a third of respondents as reasons to go to vote: economy and growth (44%), combating climate change and protecting the environment (37%), promoting human rights and democracy (37%), the way the EU should be working in the future (36%) and immigration (34%).

At least a quarter of respondents mentioned a number of other issues: social protection of EU citizens (29%), the fight against terrorism (26%), combatting youth unemployment (25%) and security and defence policy (25%). Also mentioned are the protection of external borders (21%), consumer protection and food safety (20%) and protection of personal data (12%) (see page 50 of the report).