My Lords, this amendment was previously debated in Your Lordships’ House in Committee. I and my noble friend Lord McKenzie of Luton were delighted to add our names in support of it and we do so again today. It is of course the policy of not only the Labour Party—and
now the Liberal Democrats—but of the Scottish National Party and, I believe, the Green Party and Plaid Cymru. It is also, as was referred to earlier, the policy of the Scottish Conservative Party, whose leader Ruth Davidson MSP is on record as saying that she is a fully paid-up member of the “votes at 16” club. Why would the leader of the Scottish Conservative Party support votes at 16? I suspect the answer is the experience of young people aged 16 and 17 who voted in the referendum and the 75% turnout in that group, which the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, referred to.
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The Minister should therefore speak to her colleagues in the Scottish Parliament and hear first hand why they are convinced that this is the right thing to do and have, with all other parties in that Parliament, voted to give young people aged 16 and 17 the right to vote in local and Scottish Parliament elections. Young people in Scotland took up their new responsibility with pride and a real sense of civic duty—they have shown that it was the right thing to do. We should extend this to allow other young people to vote at the age of 16 to elect local councillors across the whole of the UK.
What is also important, however, is proper citizenship education. What is offered at present is not really up to scratch and needs to be improved. The noble Lord, Lord Cormack, is a great supporter of that and on that much we are agreed—although I know he is not with me tonight on allowing 16 and 17 year-olds to vote. There is no fixed age for people to take part in a whole range of things. At present, at 16 you can consent to medical treatment, join a trade union, pay tax, consent to sexual relationships, change your name by deed poll, join the Armed Forces, be a company director, and get married, albeit with parental consent.
The reasons for opposing this amendment have been heard before—when, for example, the Labour Government chose to reduce the age from 21 to 18. I have enormous respect for the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, and the noble Lord, Lord Heseltine, but I do not agree with their remarks this evening. If you look back in history, Lord Curzon said in 1912, when talking about votes for women, that women did not have the experience to be able to vote. Looking further back to the debates on the 1832 Reform Act, landowners said that only people who had an interest in land should be allowed to vote. Today, in 2015, those statements are seen as quite ridiculous. To deny young people the vote will, in future years I am sure, also be seen as ridiculous. You can of course vote at 16 in three of the nearest Crown dependencies to the United Kingdom: the Isle of Man, the Bailiwick of Jersey and the Bailiwick of Guernsey. You can also vote at 16 in elections in Norway, Germany and Austria.
In Committee, I gave the shocking figures for the number of attainers registered to vote. I referred to the fact that we have seen a 45% drop, which is nothing short of catastrophic. Both parties in the previous Government should be ashamed of what has happened. I asked the Minister about it in our previous exchange and she said that she had not actually read the Electoral Commission report but was equally concerned about the point I had raised. Has she now read the report and what action will she be taking to
deal with this appalling state of affairs? If we were looking at another country, I am sure the Government would be saying that it was a terrible state of affairs and that it should sort it out. The Minister might also have seen the briefing from the Electoral Commission. It says very little and has, again, come out at all too short notice. Can she speak to her friend Gary Streeter, who answers questions about these issues for the Speaker’s Committee? Again and again, the Electoral Commission issues responses on these matters on the day of the debate or the night before. If they are to be meaningful, they need to come out much sooner.
I say to the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville, that I have never played first-class cricket but I am a strong supporter of Surrey County Cricket Club—I wear my club tie with pride tonight—and I have attended its matches at the Oval many times. I am also a proud supporter of the Labour cause.