Currently, there is a disparity of rights for young people aged 16-17 in the UK.

If you live in Scotland, you can currently enjoy being 16 or over by exercising your right to have legal sex, enter into a civil partnership or marriage, become the director of a company and vote for your representatives within local elections and the Scottish government.

However, in Wales, England and Northern Ireland, you can enjoy the vast majority of the above – but you can’t vote.  Yes, that’s right.  You can have sex with your MP, you can marry your MP, you can employ your MP, you can join the armed forces and fight for your MP…but you can’t vote for them.  You can leave school, get a job and pay tax to the government, but you don’t get a say in who represents you and where your taxes go.

As such, there is currently a ‘postcode lottery’ for rights, depending on where you live in the UK.  Fortunately, the Welsh Government are currently making steps to change this for young people in Wales, by releasing a 12 week consultation on electoral reform earlier this year.  The result of which has been lots of positive noise around Votes at 16 being introduced for local and Assembly elections in Wales in the near future.

Whilst this is positive news for Wales, the UK wide picture is not looking so good. On the 3^rd November, members of the current UK government blocked an attempt to secure UK wide Votes at 16 by not giving the bill enough time to be discussed.  There is another bill scheduled on the 11^th May 2018, supported by members across the House of Commons.  This presents us with another valuable opportunity to secure equality for young people across the UK.

This idea submits that TSDSU should:

• Lobby AM’s, MP’s and Local Government to give their support to the bill and for MP’s to be present upon its debate and support the bill.
• Work with like-minded partner organisations to raise awareness of the case for Votes at 16, and promote the campaign for Votes at 16.
• Consult with partner FE institutions such as Coleg Sir Gar & Coleg Ceredigion to ensure that we are being representative of our membership.
• Lobby for better education on politics for young people (across all appropriate age ranges) in order to ensure our electorate is fully equipped to make their own informed decisions about politics.

There should be no taxation without representation.  Let’s make Votes at 16 happen.

Votes at 16

NUS on Votes at 16