Engaging younger voters in the political process is no easy task. Perhaps the answer lies in the wave of digital platforms that are speaking to this generation in their own language.

As American journalist and political pundit Cal Thomas once said, “One of the reasons people hate politics is that truth is rarely a politician’s objective.” And he’s right: there aren’t many occupations, this side of being a traffic warden, that draw more ire and disdain than that of the politician.

But perhaps that resentment is justified, because politicians, by and large, are a notoriously slippery bunch. Saying one thing, doing another, claiming to have the people’s interests at heart when in fact they’re protecting their wealthy backers or, in the worst cases, just being downright corrupt. When those in power can’t be trusted, it can quite understandably lead to mass disengagement and disinterest within certain demographics.

Younger voters are particularly disenfranchised. In the UK’s general election in 2010, the turnout rate for a typical 70-year-old was 36% higher than for a typical 20-year-old, according to the Institute for Public Policy Research. Unsurprisingly this leads to a serious imbalance in whose interests politicians prioritise.

To address this, initiatives are emerging that intend to fill the information gaps in young people’s political understanding, engage them with democratic systems, and empower them to take their elected officials to task on the issues that concern them. And vitally, these services are speaking a language that this demographic is fluent in: digital. “A lack of understanding and education in schools is a real issue.

There are millions of young people not even registered to vote,” explains Steve Cole of non-profit movement Bite the Ballot, a UK-based, non-party affiliated community interest company. It aims to educate and empower young voters through platforms they’re familiar with and by using non-technical terms.

“We find that people are often put off by the language of politics – I mean, what the hell is ‘quantative easing’ to an 18-year-old?”

One of the reasons people hate politics is that truth is rarely a politician’s objective Bite the Ballot’s latest, and arguably most ambitious project to date is Leaders Live, a live-streamed debate where physically present and digital viewers can directly question the leader of a primary political party.