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Greens Senator Jordon Steele-John, the youngest member of parliament right now and the youngest Senator ever, wants to introduce a bill to lower the age of voting to 16. For anyone eighteen and above, voting would remain compulsory and for those below, the option to vote would be opened up.
Sixteen-year-olds in Australia can already consent to marriage, a piercing, be taken to court, drive cars and pay taxes. While they can also enrol to vote, they can’t turn out to tick those boxes and earn a democracy sausage until eighteen. Hundreds of thousands of votes would be up for grabs at the next election were this to go ahead. And given young people are generally more progressive, it’s an attractive piece of policy for groups like The Greens and the Labor Party.
Bill Shorten had floated this idea back in 2015, but it was criticised by the Coalition for just being a headline.
So is this latest attempt a genuine effort at opening up the democratic system to more people, or just another way to make the news?
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