Sarah Owen MP: 16 and 17 year olds deserve a voice in their future, and now they are getting one
Votes at 16 was promised in our manifesto - and now the government is delivering so that young people get a say in their future.
Every time I visit our local sixth forms, I am amazed by how bright and engaged our young people are in Luton. We are lucky to be such a young and vibrant town, home to thousands of talented young people. They also care deeply about the town and our country more broadly: what is going well, and what needs improvement.
Last year, I hosted London Mayor Sadiq Khan at Luton Sixth Form, and he was impressed by how thoughtful and engaged Luton’s sixth formers were, asking challenging but important questions about the country and the world.
16- and 17-year-olds can work – and many in Luton do – and pay taxes. They have decades of working life ahead of them and a real stake in the decisions made today. The consequence of these decisions may not be felt for many years, which is why it is so important that 16- and 17-year-olds will now get a direct say through voting.
It’s no secret that we have a crisis of democratic participation in the UK: trust in politics is low, and turnout at the last general election in Luton was barely 50%. Part of that is up to us in Westminster to fix, to show that the decisions people make at the ballot box do make a difference to people’s lives.
With revolutionary new rights at work, an expansion of free school meals and breakfast clubs, and plans to build more homes to bring costs down, I am committed to working with the government to make this change a reality.
But fixing the crisis in participation also starts by enabling more people to vote and making it easier for those that are eligible to register. Lowering the voting age and improving voter registration are two key ways that the government is getting more people involved. More forms of voter ID will be accepted too, including bank and veterans’ cards, to minimise people getting turned away. Going forward, we must follow this up by improving political education for all and start young people in the good habit of exercising their democratic right whenever elections roll around.
Broad participation is a crucial part of a healthy democracy – and this Labour government is committed to ensuring as many people as possible have a say on the future of their country.