Schedule 1 Amendments
Electoral Administration Bill
10:30 am
Diana Johnson (PPS (Mr Stephen Timms, Minister of State), Department for Work and Pensions; Kingston upon Hull North, Labour)
I am sure that everyone would like at least one of those parliamentarians to have participated in the electoral process.
I now move on to the main question: why should 16 and 17-year-olds have the vote? Over the past five years, citizenship classes have been introduced in all secondary schools. As a result, our 16-year-olds are now equipped with the knowledge and the skills to vote. Having reached that stage at the end of their time in secondary school, it seems ridiculous that they should have to wait two more years before being allowed to exercise their democratic choice to select a politician to represent them.
Now that we have citizenship classes, we ought to follow them through and give young people the vote once they have finished at secondary school. David Bell, the chief inspector of schools said in a recent democratic citizenship lecture that citizenship education was a key focus in one in five schools. The result is that young people are informed, engaged and ready to vote. That is very telling, and we need to take account of it.
I turn next to the matter of good voting habits. It is clear from research by the Social Market Foundation that those who vote at the age of 18 are more likely to continue voting for the rest of their lives. It found a link between the age at which people are first able to vote and their inclination to vote more often. People who turn 18 in the year leading up to a general election are significantly more likely to vote than those who turn 18 the year after a general election; the latter have to wait for up to five years before exercising their vote. For example, those who were 17 in 1992 had to wait until 1997, when they were 23, to vote. In the 2001 election, when they were 27, they were tracked to see what they did, and only 49 per cent. of them bothered to vote. By comparison, 65 per cent. of those who had been able to vote in 1992, and who therefore voted again in 1997, also voted in 2001. The research demonstrates that those who vote young vote often. Although lowering the voting age will not erase the birthday lottery, it will ensure that everyone can participate in a general election by the time they turn 21. That will establish healthy electoral practices, which I am sure we all support.
On the Floor of the House yesterday, I mentioned the European experience of voting at 16 and 17. I was vociferously heckled from one side of the Chamber because I managed to incorporate young people and Europe in the same sentence, which got some hon. Members rather excited. In municipal elections in Germany, 16 and 17-year-olds are allowed to vote, and the turnout for that age group is higher than for older age groups, such as those aged 24 to 35. In local elections in Austria, the turnout among 16 and 17-year-olds reaches 90 per cent. To return to the point with which I started, turnout among our younger voters is currently 37 per cent., and the possibility that we could increase that figure to 90 per cent. by incorporating 16 and 17-year-olds certainly gives us pause for thought.
Numerous organisations have actively supported such proposals for a number of years, including Barnardo’s, the British Youth Council, the Children’s Society, the Electoral Reform Society, Girlguiding UK, the Local Government Information Unit and many more. It is unfortunate that when the Electoral Commission considered the issue in 2003, it did not take too much account of the wealth of research that had been carried out in the previous 10 or 20 years.
Most importantly, organisations run for and by young people strongly support reducing the voting age to 16. The British Youth Council has been campaigning on the issue for more than two decades. Reducing the voting age has also been one of the main manifesto commitments of the UK Youth Parliament since it was established in 2000.