Róisín Garvey (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

On a separate topic, I wanted to ask why there was not six-seater constituencies in the first instance.In respect of local boundaries, my parish is small but is divided into three different electoral areas, much to the dismay of a lot of people there. The importance of keeping communities together is affected by that division. People have to drive 20 miles to vote rather than 3 miles to vote for a guy across the road from them. There are three houses together, which vote in three different electoral areas. That does not bring communities together.

I want to talk about the voting age. The programme for Government committed to an examination of the Scottish experience of reducing the voting age to 17 to draw conclusions. Many of our European neighbours have gone down the path of lowering the voting age and have not looked back. For local and regional parliamentary elections, Scotland, Wales, Estonia, Switzerland and some states in Germany have lowered the voting age to 16. In Austria, the voting age is 16 for all elections. For European elections, Austria, Germany, Greece, Malta and Belgium have lowered the voting age to 16. The Minister has spoken positively about this in the past. He was one of those driving the lowering of the voting age.

The effect of these changes have been overwhelmingly positive. One study examined the effects of lowering the voting age to 16 in 2014 on voting habits in the 2021 Scottish parliamentary elections. For the cohort that voted at 16 or 17, the authors found that socioeconomic turnout inequalities were reduced. That is of paramount importance. We want everybody at every level of society to come to the polling booth. Lowering the age increases the chance of that happening and demonstrates that it is important for our young people to have a voice no matter what socioeconomic background they come from.

For those who claim that allowing 16-year-olds to vote would compromise their childhood, their futures have already been compromised by their parents generation's inaction on climate and biodiversity. I do not accept that argument. We all know our young people are more concerned than ever about climate and biodiversity, as well as other issues. Why not give them a voice? Those who are 16 can be employed, pay tax, leave school and join political parties. Surely to God if they are able to do all those things, we should acknowledge that they have the intelligence to be able to vote.

I have worked with teenagers for more than 15 years. They are eloquent and we can learn so much from them. It is important that we get that across the line as soon as possible. We committed to examining it in the programme for Government. We need to give our young people under the age of 18 the right to vote. We can register them to vote in secondary schools. We have made it much simpler to register to vote; you simply go to register.ie and can do it in a few seconds. We need to acknowledge the ability of young people to understand the political system. We need to give 16- and 17-year-olds the right to vote.