Voting age to be lowered to 16 by next general election
160 comments
·July 17, 2025heeton
terminalshort
Because the party in power feels like they can win > 50% of the 16-17 year old vote and therefore it is an advantage to them. They do not feel that moving away from FPP is an advantage to them. Functioning democracy is not their goal. Staying in power is.
plantain
Nonsense. Labour (largely) supported ditching first past the post in the referendum. The opposition/conservative party campaigned against it.
robin_reala
Every time Labour gets into power, FPTP reformation is mysteriously never considered.
mytailorisrich
Labour has an overwhelming majority in Parliament right now despite a relatively poor share of the vote because of FPTP.
As long as Reform UK splits the Tory vote FPTP will continue to be in Labour's interests.
In fact, at the moment moving away from FPTP would mostly benefit Reform UK and the Lib Dems, possibly the Tories, too as this point.
leereeves
Labour was out of power at the time, and Conservatives were in power, so that's not a counterexample.
bell-cot
The current first-past-the-post system works quite well, for those who have the power to change the system.
Vs. - in the last U.K. election, which party was the most vocal about that first-past-the-post system needing replacement? What % of the votes were cast for them?
d1sxeyes
This was relatively recently floated (2011) and thrown out to referendum (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_United_Kingdom_Alternat...), where it was watered down to Alternative Vote rather than full PR and eventually rejected. Obviously none of these 16 year olds would have been old enough to vote in the referendum (or indeed have been born when it took place).
~One thing to bear in mind is that FPTP limits the influence of “extreme” parties on elections (see UKIP’s vote share in 2015), but at the expense of requiring more mainstream parties to pander to those voters to avoid splitting the vote share. Jury is still out I think on what’s “best” here and probably depends on what “best” means to the person forming an opinion.~
Edit: turns out the above is at best contested, at worst disproven.
pjc50
It was a huge mess; basically the only people properly backing it were the Lib Dems, Labour were not out there in favor of it and in any case the media (overwhelmingly Tory) were against it. Just as with Brexit. The UK is basically not to be trusted with referendums.
The weird thing is how many different election systems are in use in the UK depending on what the politics of each devolved assembly is "supposed to be".
roenxi
FPTP tends to be the system that most reliably favours extreme candidates [0] - everything else promotes candidates who are most in tune community norms. Candidates who don't align with any of the voters tend not to get in under any fundamentally democratic system - someone who is willing to do what they're promising but more in tune with the voters have an easy time against that sort of candidate.
Although just from browsing the UKs AV proposal it does look like it'd be similar to IRV which has some wild results in certain tight races. Although I personally think that is fine; a little randomness is good for the system.
noja
I think the very idea that a single party would encompass a voter's entire set of beliefs is ridiculous and antiquated.
plantain
They had a referendum on it in 2011 and decided to keep FPTP. You can lead the horse to water, but you can't make it drink.
roenxi
The article suggests that the people in charge of the system want children to be more involved in making political decisions. This signals a lot about what is happening in elite circles.
If that is the nature of the atmosphere then I doubt many important people are going to put their head above the parapet and call for reforms in the direction of adults getting better political expression. The power holders don't think that is favourable to them.
mytailorisrich
Lowering the voting age is a purely tactical move by Labour because they think that it will favour them.
aqme28
That's a lot harder than changing a number by 2
beck5
So 16 year olds are wise enough to vote, but not fully leave education, buy alcohol, drive a car, join the army and get married without your parents consent, the lists goes on.
robin_reala
There’s no one list. For all the things you mentioned, they are allowed to drive tractors or quads, get married with your parents’ consent, have kids, etc.
alasdairking
You now have to 18 to marry. The age of consent remains sixteen. So having a baby is fine, but so long as you are not married.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/legal-age-of-marriage-in-...
ben_w
Think how weird this would be to someone from the UK a century ago:
"You can have a bisexual orgy on your 16th birthday where someone gets pregnant in celebration of their first time voting, but under no circumstances is the woman allowed to be married until the kid is 15 months old, at which point she can marry another woman. Photographs of the event will, in many jurisdictions, be treated as a criminal offence even though the act itself isn't and those same photos would be fine at 18, which is also now the age when they are no longer subject to a mandatory choice between ongoing education or an apprenticeship."
Also, TIL that the UK was going to get compulsory part-time education from 14 to 18 back in 1918, but spending cuts happened: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_Act_1918
robin_reala
Ah, I’ve been out of the UK too long.
giantg2
Nobody actually provides permission to have kids. That could happen as soon as it's biologically possible.
d1sxeyes
Also you can join the army at 16 with parental consent.
alasdairking
You can become a "junior soldier", which means you go to college in Harrogate until you are 18 and actually become a soldier.
https://jobs.army.mod.uk/regular-army/entry-options/soldier/
gchamonlive
Why do you think you need to have all civil liberties before being allowed to vote? Does it make you a better voter if you can leave school, drink alcohol, drive a car, join the army and get married without your parents consent? This is absurd.
chrisandchris
IMHO, it is all about right and duties.
So you're allowed to vote, but you don't need to pay your taxes. You're still considered a child regarding justice law, but considered adult regarding voting?
So basically you're not allowed to camp somewhere without the consent of your parents but you're "suddenly old enough" to judge about some laws?
I think the consensus is missing if voting is permitted by 16, but everything else stays the same.
_Algernon_
If you have sufficient income or wealth at 16 you do have to pay taxes. It just happens that most 16 year olds don't have sufficient wealth or income to pay taxes. There is very little difference in terms of duties of a 16 year old and an unemployed adult who does get to vote.
Phil_Latio
Somewhere one has to draw the line, or you can go down to voting power for toddlers. And the best and obvious line was to treat an adult human as a "full" citizen with all the rights and duties.
So how far down in age would you go and why would you stop at that age?
lantry
Oh no not the slippery slope! I think 16 sounds good. I would not let anyone younger than 16 vote, because it's against the law.
_Algernon_
I'd argue earliest age at which you can be drafted minus maximum term length (ie. 5 years in the UK) sounds good as a general rule. Otherwise people can get drafted by a government they didn't have a say in electing.
I'd also argue that there should be no lower age limit for voting for people with taxable income. No taxation without representation.
swat535
Voting has a major impact on a nation's future.
I don't think children should have a say in the matter, they lack the critical thinking skills that adults do, which is why we limit their freedoms.
Granted, most adults also lack deep critical thinking skills but they have more capable brains than children.
Further, children are easier to manipulate than adults, which is very dangerous when it comes to something as critical as voting.
gchamonlive
When it was the last time we had an actual issue where 16yo voting had direct measurable negative impact on something in real life? I think it's as other said, we have to draw a line, and I think it's reasonable to debate this because maybe each nation prepares their kids differently so one nations 16yo isn't another, this way there isn't a universal rule. But arguing that you have to discuss ALL the other civil liberties before discussing 16yo voting rights is absurd because there is no connection between drinking and voting and all else.
pjc50
> Does it make you a better voter if you can leave school, drink alcohol, drive a car
I don't think we're being ambitious enough here. I should be able to vote while drink-driving.
gchamonlive
I honestly thought this is how the majority of the Americans voted last election.
rpcorb
Of course it makes you a better voter. Because you have skin in the game.
What's absurd is allowing a minor to vote.
burgerone
Social media will have a greater effect on votes than ever before
Urahandystar
I think were past that point with boomers, If anything this generation will be much more wise to the tricks than any that came before it.
giantg2
We can hope, but tif we look at hospitalizations for social media challenges, the demographics don't support your theory.
_heimdall
At least with alcohol, there are chemical factors at play that have less to do with how wise a person is.
nerdjon
We can try to argue all day along about whether or not someone 16 actually knows enough about what is going on to vote. But that completely falls apart when you can talk to many adults and they don't know either (see reactions to US election).
I think this also makes sense, I know when I was younger I was extremely frustrated to see adults making really bad decisions for my country that will have a much longer impact on my life than it will on theirs.
I think a minimum age makes sense, I don't think someone in elementary has any point in voting since most likely they would just do what their parents told them. But by 16 you are generally making your own decisions, your figuring out your adult plans, and not following everything your parents say.
like_any_other
> But that completely falls apart when you can talk to many adults and they don't know either
What all these "well adults are dumb too!" arguments ignore is that, those adults were even dumber when they were 2 (or 5, compared to the original voting age of 21) years younger.
nerdjon
Were they though?
At least when you are forced to be in school you are in an environment to likely absorb... something. We regularly kept up with current events in school.
I know many adults that have basically zero idea what is going on in the world.
Also I should note that I did not claim anything about intelligence, but just an awareness of what is going on and the impact of it.
I would possibly even argue that a 16 year old being in school likely has a fresher recollection of history than many adults. I mean how many adults remember all of the math they learned compared to 16 year olds.
msgodel
Ah ... something. Where would we be without something?
techterrier
while it seems a bit daft to me, in practical terms i dont think many of these kids are going to turn out
hagbard_c
They can be made to turn out easily as children around that age - yes, children, teenage children but still children - are highly susceptible to group pressure. I do wonder whether the Labour leaders who thought this would help them win the next election have had a look at the results of many of those school polls which do not paint a rosy picture for old stodgy parties like Labour. It is far more likely for someone like Farage to benefit from 16yo boys being able to vote and whatever radical leftie - no name comes to mind which is a problem for the political left in the UK - to gain votes from 16yo girls.
_Algernon_
One argument for lowering voting age is given by selectorate theory. Basically it argues that higher coalition size (the number of people that participate in decision making) is what causes democracy to benefit the masses. Because parties compete for votes, they are forced to distribute societal goods back to a large portion of the population instead of only distributing it to their cronies. Arguably the quality of voting in terms decision making is secondary, if it matters at all. By this theory, lowering voting age is a boon to democracy.
null
giantg2
Adding 2 additional years of people won't make enough of a difference for that theory. The truth is, one party is pushing for this because they stand to benefit from it because it will slightly bump up their support numbers.
like_any_other
> Arguably the quality of voting in terms decision making is secondary, if it matters at all.
It doesn't matter who we vote for, as long as we vote? What a bad joke. By this theory, all foreign interference, propaganda, education, control of the news, etc.. are completely irrelevant, nothing we should be concerned about at all. Just vote and it'll be fine!
_Algernon_
>It doesn't matter who we vote for, as long as we vote?
More that voting egotistically (in contrast to trying to predict what is best for society as a whole) is sufficient to create the incentives that benefit the many, as long as the number of voters makes up a high enough share of the population.
panarchy
I don't get why letting a few thousand extra people participate in politics gets people so worked up. I think it's good to get people involved in politics while they're still learning about it. You can tell them the importance of democratic participation and also let them actually engage in it instead of it falling to the back of their mind and being forgotten years later when they can actually vote.
Also I was more politically aware at 16 than most adult I know now.
leereeves
A few thousand? I would think 16 & 17 year olds in the UK would be a couple million people.
panarchy
https://www.bath.ac.uk/publications/the-age-divide-in-uk-pol...
This being the first thing I found says the closest age bracket 18-34 turnout was 53.6%
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d6/UK_Popul...
16-17 for each gender looks to be a little under 400K for each
So (4)(400,000)(0.536) = 857,600
So thousands.
Either way it's not like they're all going to vote one way and it's not like they can seize the government with their own special interest party that only caters to 16-17 year old even if they all managed to vote one way. So really as far as results it will mostly be a wash, but has the benefit of potentially creating some more engaged and politically active citizens which is a win for democracy.
netbioserror
Horrific idea. Those paying into the system should have the strongest stake, not those with elementary ideas and no stake at all (or worse, those dependent upon the system's rewards).
jackvalentine
Time to cancel the right to vote for anyone 70+ then right? They don’t really have much of a stake in the outcome anymore.
netbioserror
If you're implying that money printing significantly benefits the generation which instates it and bankrupts everyone who comes after, then I agree. And democracies have a long history of relying on debasement to fund their excesses, a significant factor in their implosions.
johneth
16-year-olds do pay into the system. Some may have jobs or apprenticeships that pay them, for which they're directly taxed. Some may have started their own business, which will pay tax. All will pay VAT when they buy products and services.
Palmik
Can you explain why you think that? Do you think person's voting power should be directly proportional to how much they pay in taxes? (Beyond the already indirect influence of money)
In a very important sense, 16 year old has a much bigger stake in the future of their country than a 70 year old.
netbioserror
>Do you think person's voting power should be directly proportional to how much they pay in taxes?
Not quite, because that would grant power and influence to the rich that is already quite heavy on account of their wealth and ability to employ constituents. Qualifying voting power by way of being an active payer is, however, absolutely sensible.
>A 16 year old has a much bigger stake in the future of their country than a 70 year old.
They also have nothing to lose. With the least invested in a system's continuation, history is rich with young teenage raiders, conquerors, mutineers, revolutionaries, and rioters. They are the primary demographic with the lowest stake, and have the least concern for any Chesterton's fences. They are also the poorest equipped to make decisions concerning material resources, since utopian idealism is common at that age. They haven't yet suffered or built much at all, and it's easy for them to dismiss the sheer volume of accumulated knowledge, material, and labor that sustains civilization.
_heimdall
What do you mean by "strongest stake" here?
Those paying the most already are more invested in the outcomes of the country, do you mean their vote should count for more or less based on how much they pay in taxes?
sethammons
I'd be interested in a system where you can gain additional voting power based on $stake. Everyone gets a vote, but based on $criteria, you gain additional votes.
Youth and parents get an extra vote on school stuff. Those whose education or career are related to a field get an extra vote. In some cases, you may hold 5x the voting power of someone who is removed and unfamiliar with a topic.
No idea if anything like that has been explored.
_heimdall
I'd hate to see that system implemented. The point of every person getting one vote is to even the playing field. Everyone living under that authority's rule should have an equal say in who runs that authority.
Allowing people to have more or less say based on stake would lead to a spiral. Those in charge take care of the people they care about, those people would continue to elect the same politicians, and everyone else would be left aside while power (and stake) consolidates.
netbioserror
It's simply unwise to distribute power, however minute, to those who don't yet know where their food comes from.
_heimdall
I would argue that a majority of the voting population in the west doesn't know where their food comes from.
optimalsolver
So just men of property, right? Preferably also only direct descendants of Magna Carta signatories.
Ekaros
Net tax payers in past parliament. Receive private pension or public health care or use some public service. Well you are out of voter pool. Corporate handouts should also be counted. Own stock in company that gets some public funds and that is counted against you.
hermannj314
The essence of Democracy is voting for a bond measure whose principal you'll never live long enough to see paid down.
Children voting will ruin the grift.
like_any_other
The article doesn't feature even a single opinion opposed to lowering the voting age. Interesting. I guess the British public unanimously supports this change?
leereeves
The article does include at least one opinion opposed to lowering the voting age:
> However, Conservative shadow minister Paul Holmes said the government's position was "hopelessly confused".
> "Why does this government think a 16-year-old can vote but not be allowed to buy a lottery ticket, an alcoholic drink, marry, or go to war, or even stand in the elections they're voting in?" he asked in the Commons.
like_any_other
Looks like the article was just updated - that part was missing from the version I got, which archive luckily caught: https://web.archive.org/web/20250717102421/https://www.bbc.c...
freetinker
More gullible fodder to influence via handheld screens.
_rpxpx
Good. Given Keir Starmer's abysmal behaviour, this is about the only chance there is of keeping a Tory/Reform coalition out at the next election. I would like to see voting age capped also, at 70. Increasingly senile and racist pensioners in comfortable homes are dominating British politics with horrific consequences.
hagbard_c
Ehhh so Starmer being a doddering idiot should be countered with keeping those who want to topple him from doing so? That does not make sense, does it? Whither democracy when those who 'vote wrong' can simply be labelled 'senile and racist' or similar and kept from casting their vote?
giantg2
Why would you need to add bank cards when you cana already request a voter certified ID?
leke
This is going to push the legalize cannabis movement forward by 2 years.
I don’t quite understand why reforming the actual system, and moving away from first-past-the-post, isn’t higher on everyone’s list.
It feels like we don’t have a functioning democracy in the U.K., and that gets in the way of pretty much everything else.