Burnham champions young people's involvement in politics

12.00.00am UTC (GMT +0000) Mon 7th Jul 2008

Eleanor Burnham, Welsh Liberal Democrat spokesperson for Children and Young People, is championing the involvement of children and young people in politics after taking part in two events which allowed children to participate and engage in political issues.

Ms Burnham answered questions and debated with young people at the British Youth Council and Funky Dragon's Young People and Your Democracy event in the Assembly and Deeside's Rotary Club's Mini Welsh Assembly event held in Flintshire's County Council Chamber.

Eleanor Burnham said:

"I'm always delighted and privileged to meet with and debate with our future voters. Of those young people who attended the British Youth Council's event, 87% now felt they would register to vote. This is an amazing figure and just shows how young people can be positively and successfully engaged in politics if they are given the correct opportunity.

"As I've previously said, we need to confidently engage younger people in politics and lower the voting age to 16 so that tomorrow's constituents are knowledgeable and can make well informed choices. If you don't get young people involved in politics early then you run the risk of them switching off and becoming disengaged from the political sphere. If young people were allowed to vote at the age of 16 and engage in the decisions that govern their lives, it would help give them a better sense of control and higher self esteem. By doing this the number of people who turn out to vote in the future should also increase.

"Seeing young people's enthusiasm for these two events demonstrates that reducing the voting age to 16 would certainly help maintain young people's enthusiasm for politics."

End / Diwedd