Shane: Lowering the voting age is something I definitely think should happen because at 16 we are legal to marry and stuff, but we are still not allowed to vote.
Kyle: We don’t pay taxes, though.
Callum: The turnout every time they have an election is so small and we all have opinions too, and some of us would like to vote and say stuff.
Kyle: Especially on education policies .
Callum: . considering we are the ones actually in it.
Shane: I think they still class us as children, just because we’re in school, but I’m doing Higher modern studies, which is mostly politics, so would expect something like that would mean I’m allowed to vote. There are a lot of adults that don’t vote, and yet they don’t give us the chance to vote. If we were allowed to vote, I am sure most people would.
Callum: There are some people our age who aren’t mature. The thing with politics is it always seems really complicated, like what each party stands for, and it seems to change all the time, but if you just broke it down for people to what each person was standing for, I think they would be able to pick one and it would make sense. I think letting people vote from 16 seems about sensible.
Kyle: With all the other rights you get then - you can join the army, get married.
Callum: We do a lot of things adults do. We’re not supposed to drink and stuff, but we do.
Shane: Obviously, you would need to know what each party stands for, you need to know what they are going to do.
Kyle: Or what they claim they are going to do.
Callum: A lot of us are very cynical about politics as well, we always say “oh, they say they are going to do that, but they probably won’t”. Maybe that’s through all the satire on TV, like Mock the Week and stuff. So we all know the politicians who are in scandals and stuff.
Shane: I know that my mum doesn’t really understand politics, and I have been learning politics since a young age. It is something that I have considered going into, so I understand the things going on.
Callum: I have different opinions from my parents, so if they didn’t want to vote, I would still like to say something and not just be bound by what they thought.
Kyle: Most important for me is education. I wouldn’t really be looking at anything else. I’m starting uni in a couple of years, I want to make sure it stays free.
Callum: We are all planning ahead for college and university.
Kyle: Where I go to university is now not dependent on the best courses, it’s dependent on how much it’s going to cost.
Callum: I don’t like to think I have no control over my future.
