General British politics discussion thread

Not sure what it is as a proportion of UK population of working age, but seen 3.5mil mentioned as on "health-linked benefits" (FT being the one newspaper I trust to get numbers right).

I would have thought that it was a well understood end result 'if the UK went to war with Russia' anyway. It would be the same if they went to war with the US... obviously!! It's just saber-rattling by profound statement by the rags.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14584679/Keir-Starmer-double-downs-pledge-16-year-olds-vote-despite-claims-Labour-trying-rig-future-elections.html

Earlier this week, Starmer confirmed Labour's plan to give 16-year-olds the right to vote in the UK general election.

Is it a foregone conclusion that the plan will come to fruition?

Nothing is certain in politics so, no, it's not a foregone conclusion. But I would say it's odds-on.

On what basis could they mount a legal challenge?

There's no doubt that Parliament has the power to set the voting age (and to regulate every other aspect of voting). They changed the voting age in 1969, from 21 to 18; they can change it again if they wish.

Brexit definitely didn't show lunatics over the age of 25 taking over the asylum or more recently the rise of Reform, that's definitely an indicator for a sensible and mature electorate.

You'll find that similar sentiments were expressed when the voting age was lowered from 21 to 18, but the sky didn't fall and nobody now seeks to have the age raised again.

The point about cerebral development continuing until age 25 is interesting, but the only country actually to set 25 as the votin age is, SFAIK, the UAE, which is hardly a shining example of a mature and functioning democracy. You describe having a voting age of below 18 as "bizarre" but, in fact, if the UK adopts it it will join quite a number of other countries that already give the vote to under-18s; they presumably don't cpnsider it bizarre. And if the neurological evidence points to the age of 25 as representing a developmental milestone, it seems rather arbitrary to say that 18 is the boundary of bizarreness. Why not 16? Or 21?

As for the Greens holding the balance of power in the Scots Parliament, all your conclusions about this are based on a single policy that you personlly don't like. While the Green vote does trend young, the Brexit/UKIP/Reform vote trends elderly. As between the political instincts of Green voters and the poliitical instincts of reform voters, I know which I would rather put my trust in.

And, for a counter-example, Trump was elected by the votes of the over-65s (as in, if they hadn't voted, Harris would have won). We can't be sure, because the voting preferences of under-18s are not well-surveyed in the US, but it seems likely that if the 16-18 year olds had voted, Harris would again have won. So excluding the under-18s doesn't necessarily guarantee that the lunatics won't take over the asylum; it may in fact have the result that they do.

(Having said all that, I'm not myself a fan of giving the vote to 16-year olds. But I think the arguments one way or the other are much more finely balanced than you present, and the arguments you favour would in fact suggest that the voting age should be raised signficantly. If you're not pressing for that, maybe you don't really have that much confidence in your arugments? Maybe your opposition boils down to this; it's a policy that wouldn't favour the side of politics that you support.)

Oh god not this prefrontal bullsht again.

Brexit, Boris and Trump have made it very very unquestionably clear that it is not the under 25s who are brain-dead when it comes to voting.

If we want stable no nonsense politics I say take the vote away from the loony radical age groups like pensioners.

TDs and Senators didn't read closely the legislation that they passed in the wake of the gay-marriage referendum. As for your bigotry claim, the women at the Wi Spa in Los Angeles would disagree with you.

Mod: warning for trolling given

It doesn't matter which country it happens. Just because it hasn't happened here yet doesn't mean it won't.

You're obviously much younger than me. Let me tell you, young-un, that in the UK, at the time when the voting age was lowered to 18, armed troops were deployed on the streets to protect citizens from sectarian and terrorist violence because the police could not be trusted, and sectarian riots and ethnic cleansing were in full swing.

You may want to bracket protests at Israel's conduct of the war in Gaza as "street protests celebrating the massacres of Jews", but (a) nobody takes you seriously, and you know this perfectly well, and (b) even if this were true, it would represent a much lower threat to democracy and human rights than the UK was in fact facing in the summer of 1969.

Your implication that if 16-years olds are granted the vote in Westminster the ensuing election will bring the "far left" to power and there will be no more elections is too silly to bother refuting, so I won't bother refuting it.

If you want a serious discussion of the policitical and electoral impact of enfranchising 16-18 year olds, come back with some actual empirical data on the actual party preferences of 16-18 year olds, plus some actual data on the actual percentage of the electorate that 16-18 years old would represent, if they were enfranchised, and we'll take it from there.

So Reynolds is wrong to say "there was no deal" but then she goes on the attack with the line that the deal was never completed.

But in pure Trump style bollix it would have been a great deal. The best deal.

Reynolds can play that Westminster style panto speaking pretty well. Has that good mix of sharp and jokey.

If it's combined with a mandatory civics/politics course in school, it could be a great way to educate and include people in the political machine from a young age.

Shows you how stupid Britain and a large number of people have gone in recent months that not watching a fictional drama is considered a failure by a politician.

People really have lost the run of themselves about Adolescence, it's just a drama series not a documentary like Starmer and BBC breakfast tried to claim it is. Her reaction to it is perfectly sensible.