THE Conservative Party is targeting students to swell its membership in Liverpool – and eventually win back control of the city council.

Three university-based branches of Conservative Future, the party's society for under-30s, have been launched in the city.

At the University of Liverpool, where there has been no Tory organisation since 2004, around 100 students have expressed an interest in joining.

Twenty-one members are already fully enrolled.

This compares to 75 Labour Students, 60 of which are newly signed up this year, and 10 members of Liberal Youth.

Neil Wilson, Conservative Future's area chairman for Merseyside, said: "It's all about involving young people in politics in a city where they are starting to look around them and wonder just what the Lib-Dems and Labour have really done for them."

In May, when the Conservatives fielded a candidate in all Liver-pool wards, every one was aged under 27, with the youngest 18. Chris Grayling, shadow minister for Merseyside, said younger members were providing a much-needed boost of enthusiasm.

He said: "I’ve always said win-ning seats in Liverpool is a long- haul task, but the situation is now beginning to change.

"In Woolton, we reduced the Lib- Dem majority from 1,200 to 500."

At Liverpool JMU, the new Conservative Future branch has 10 paid-up members, compared to one in Liberal Youth.

JMU's Labour Students chairman declined to give specific figures, but said: "We have had more members than the Liberal Democrats and the Tories put together since 2007."

Since the local elections of 1996, the city has not had a single Conservative councillor.

IN TOMORROW'S Daily Post: 19-year-old Conservative Future member Paul Athans tells how his first ever vote was for himself.

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