What Shrek tells us about the different way the Tories and Labour use TikTok

Keir Starmer, Rishi Sunak and the late Cilla Black have all appeared on General Election TikTok (Picture: TikTok/UKLabour/UKConservatives)

The first surprising thing about the TikTok accounts of the Conservatives and Labour is that neither are more than a week old.

Yes, even Paul Chuckle has been using TikTok for longer than the UK’s two biggest political parties.

Despite the mammoth influence that the social network holds over young people in the country, both decided to wait until the General Election was called last week before setting up on the platform.

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The second surprising thing is the sheer number of posts you’ll see on one compared to the other.

If you take a look at the Tories’ account just now, you’ll find a total of four posts: three videos adding up to less than two and a half minutes of content, and one slideshow featuring a ‘threat review’ of Labour’s shadow cabinet.

In the latest post, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak appears in the same grey void from the party’s first TikTok post, answering a policy question from a user. More on that later.

It’s quite formal, a little staid, though it certainly gets a clear message across. But is that what TikTok users want?

Let’s turn to the Labour account, which has a whopping 28 videos up so far – an average of about nine per day.

You may be surprised to see the two people who feature in the party’s two most popular videos so far, both of which have attracted more than 2,100,000 views.

One is Lord Farquaad from the 2001 film Shrek, and the other is the late Cilla Black.

If you’re not a TikTok user, that might be a little baffling. But if you know, you know: that’s absolutely the kind of patter Generation Z loves.

Yes, there are clips of Keir Starmer. But there are also clips of Louie Spence and Harry Potter and Barry from EastEnders singing Something Inside So Strong. It’s semi-ironic, it’s camp and it’s actually pretty funny.

Interestingly, both Labour and the Conservatives are currently focusing their TikTok energies on a single policy: the proposed reintroduction of National Service.

They know their audience – the platform’s users skew young, obviously, so they’re more likely to be directly affected by the idea.

The Tories are doing their best to gently convince TikTokers that it would provide them with ‘valuable life skills’. Rishi Sunak used the latest video to reveal teens would receive a stipend to help with living costs as they complete their service.

Meanwhile, Labour has found a rich seam in taking the mick out of the idea. And for the moment, it appears to have been more successful.

Thanks in no small part to Farquaad and Cilla, the opposition has collected more than 53,000 TikTok followers and 1.1 million likes.

The party in power, on the other hand, has fewer than 15,000 followers and just 97,100 likes on its videos.

But let’s not forget that the typical TikToker belongs to a demographic that’s not particularly likely to vote. So whether that online popularity may not necessarily translate to electoral success on July 4.

And while you’re here, please remember to follow Metro’s Alright, Gov? on TikTok for more politics chat that actually matters to you.

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