My Lords, Amendment 73 would have the effect of lowering the voting age for local government elections in England and Wales from 18 to 16. There is no doubt that the Scottish referendum debate was unique in the way that it engaged the public and secured the participation of 16 and 17 year- olds in a way that we have not seen before—I absolutely acknowledge that, as well as the other factors that may have engaged the people of Scotland.
It is clear that lowering the voting age to 16 for local elections in England and Wales is a major change to the fundamental building blocks of the country’s democracy. The starting point for making such change would seem to be that those democratically elected to represent the people of this country consider all the issues involved, seek the views of those they represent, and seek to recognise where public opinion stands on the issue and what would maintain confidence in ensuring that the elections are free and fair and give genuine voice to the people. They discuss the issues and, having carefully weighed the argument and recognised where consensus and opinion lie across the country, decide whether or not to make the change.
This should be the approach to deciding whether to make fundamental changes to our election systems. It is entirely consistent with this approach for the Scottish Parliament to decide that the voting age for local government elections in Scotland, and there the Parliament has now decided to reduce the voting age to 16.
It is clearly right for Parliament to consider whether there should be a change to the franchise for local government elections in England. However, noble Lords may wish to reflect on whether it is appropriate that such a fundamental electoral change should be instigated in your Lordships’ House—an unelected Chamber—rather than in the other place. Whatever the quality of the many and varied discussions we have had today, we can all agree that, although the quality of our debate is high, we have necessarily not had the wide-ranging consideration which can happen only following a debate across the country and after hearing the views of many on the issue. In short, whatever merits there may be in making this change to the franchise for local elections, today is not the time and this Bill is not the vehicle.
As to its merit, noble Lords will know that the Government have no plans to lower the minimum voting age. In most democracies, including most of the EU member states, the voting age is also 18. In the EU, only Austria allows voting for 16 year-olds. The age of 18—not 16—is widely recognised as the age at which one becomes an adult and gains full citizenship rights. In 2014, the Select Committee which conducted an inquiry into lowering the voting age to 16 noted in its report that the available evidence suggests that the public are in general satisfied with the voting age as it is.
The noble Earl, Lord Listowel, spoke about the broader issue of the transition from childhood to adulthood, which deserves fuller consideration than as an adjunct to the Bill. He talked about the vulnerabilities, in many ways, of 16 and 17 year-olds to various external influences.
I shall refer to comments made by noble Lords in this House on that point. In the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill 2012, the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, said:
“My Lords, given the time, happily this is a short amendment. The Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 established that people under the age of 17 years are to be treated as children and therefore have to be questioned or interviewed in the presence of an appropriate adult, but people of 17 years of age and up to 18 are not treated in the same way. The Government have dealt with what has been an anomaly about treating 17 year-olds as adults for the purposes of bail, and that has now been changed to lift the age to 18. It would seem to be consonant with that approach if the appropriate adult provision was also extended from 17 years of age to 18. This is a straightforward matter”.—[Official Report, 15/2/12; col. 882.]
During proceedings on the, Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015, noble Lords opposite recognised that:
“Anyone who is the parent of a teenager or whose children were recently teenagers knows that at that age a person is on the cusp of adulthood. They are moving out of childhood and into adulthood. It is often a very difficult stage where young people appear to be very mature and yet at the same time they are childlike and vulnerable”.—[Official Report, 23/7/14; col. 1201.]
That was said by the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of The Shaws.
The noble Lord, Lord Tyler, talked about discriminating against 16 and 17 year-olds. Deciding whether or not to give the vote to 16 and 17 year-olds is not a question of removing some inappropriate discrimination; it is about what is appropriate for 16 and 17 year-olds, who are at the point of moving out of childhood and approaching adulthood. Many things are not appropriate for people at that point in their lives. They cannot marry without parental consent, as the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, said; they are treated in special ways in various aspects of the criminal justice system; and they cannot join the Army without parental consent.
For the reasons I have set out we cannot support the amendment and I hope that the noble Lord will agree to withdraw it for two reasons only: first, this is not the Bill to decide a huge issue such as this; and, secondly, we are an unelected Chamber and it is not for us to propose a change in the franchise.