Stockport Labour Group’s Cllr Colin Foster made a powerful case for votes in the EU referendum to be extended to Stockport’s thousands of 16 and 17 year olds at a recent full council meeting. He argued convincingly that they can already give consent to medical treatment, pay income tax and national insurance, get married or enter a civil partnership, and join the armed forces.
Opposing the Labour motion, Tory Leader Cllr Syd Lloyd suggested, rather bizarrely, that the minimum age of 24 for owning some categories of motorbike was somehow relevant to being allowed to vote.
He also dismissed the principle of no taxation without representation because ‘a 14 year old pays VAT when he spends his pocket money on sweets – should they be able to vote?’
So far so nonsensical.
Cllr Lloyd then argued that it would create inequality to be old enough to vote at 16 but not old enough stand for election. This totally ignores the fact that 18 to 21 year olds were only given the right to stand for election as late as 2006.
The irony of a Tory complaining about creating inequality seemed to escape him.
All this however was merely a warm-up act for Cllr John Wright (Conservative, Stepping Hill) who shared his years of wisdom gained as a physics teacher, saying ‘Lowering the voting age is likely to reduce turnout even further.’
Not sure how you worked that one out John!
He continued ‘16 and 17 year olds can have sex. Well, this may be true, but is it desirable?’ Amused whispers of ‘desirable for who?’ could be heard around the chamber at this point.
‘There are many intelligent young people who understand complex issues and coming to a reasonable and rational decision…’
Labour councillors nodded in agreement at this sudden outbreak of common sense only to be dumbfounded as Cllr Wright continued:
‘…there are also many more who are still quite immature and while they may be able to cope with something as simple as physics, they are not able to consider more complex topics in a reasoned and mature way. Young people shouldn’t be burdened with having to make decisions which have far-reaching consequences.’
He managed to finish his speech with the sensible observation that ‘the EU Referendum will be a crucial decision for the country’.
We can all agree with that, but let’s just hope for the sake of the electorate that the rules about who can and can’t vote in the EU Referendum aren’t written by the likes of Cllr Lloyd and Cllr Wright!