United Kingdom: Young people should be encouraged to vote as soon as possible after their 18th birthday to start a habit of a lifetime, advises expert | Wales Online
A leading Welsh expert on voting has told MPs it is “vital” that young people cast their first votes as close to their 18th birthdays as possible so they start the habit of a lifetime. The warning from Rebecca Rumbul of Cardiff University’s Wales Governance Centre comes at a time of high concern about low turnouts in recent election. In the recent European elections, less than one in three eligible people took part. Around four of 10 of the electorate voted in the 2011 National Assembly election and only 36% participated in that year’s referendum on law-making powers. She is concerned there is a “growing group of young people who will probably never reach that point where they engage in voting”. One option to encourage voting, she suggested in her evidence, was to allow people to register to vote on election day.