Getting out the young vote

by frog

It’s heartening that young people have embraced a campaign encouraging them to use text messages to get election enrolment packs. More than twice as many young people have requested packs as part of this year’s Electoral Enrolment Centre’s youth voting campaign compared with the same campaign last election year. It’s the text message option that’s made all the difference apparently.

Despite over 18s being legally required to enrol, about a quarter of 18-24-year-olds are not enrolled, compared to about 5% of over-25s. Young people not voting should be a concern for all parties, not just those who gain disproportionate support among the young (Labour and the Greens). Voting is a disease best caught young, because if you start voting at the earliest opportunity, you’re more likely to make a habit of it for the rest of your life. And the vast majority of the public voting is what any well-functioning democracy relies on.

So, perhaps the Electoral Enrolment Centre should be thinking of even more novel ways to get young people to enrol. Presumably in this day and age of email, spamming every Year 12 and 13 student and every university and polytech student in the country with a “click here to enrol” email would net quite a few new enrolled voters? It’d just involved contacting all secondary schools and tertiary education providers in the country and asking them for lists of students and their email addresses. Alas, I know it would be against the law and trample on young people’s privacy and so on, and so couldn’t and shouldn’t be done.

But, in a more helpful suggestion, what about setting up polling booths in schools and universities and polytechnics during the week before election day, so that young people can cast special votes between classes?