Are you actively encouraging your young people to vote?

[HappydaysArehere]

As we swayed one way and the other, we have come to the conclusion that as we are the older generation we should primarily consider the wishes of the young people. We asked our grandsons for their opinions. The younger one is studying economics for A level and has a great historical perspective and love of the subject. He tells me that anyone who understands anything about finance will vote to remain in Europe and it will be the old people who vote to leave. His brother is of the same opinion and he has been running a business. I have warned them if they don't vote the old people will be voting and by the time things are unravelled we will be dead and they will have to do their best with the mistake we might have made. Listening to fellow oldies it seems that their views are somewhat narrow and focussed on what has been and not on now. Please give the young generation a chance by explaining this to them. It's all about them, not us oldies.

[lljkk]

My son wants to vote UKIP as a rule... so neah. He could die under a bus tomorrow & I could live another 50 yrs.

[HappydaysArehere]

So there you are! Another thing to consider! I can understand your point of view but I haven't got fifty years unless the elixir of youth is discovered post haste. So here is hoping all will turn out well.....

[howmanyairmiles]

No its a subject I would never encourage, I have only ever voted once when I turned 18 and haven't voted since and won't be bothering in the future.

If any of them ask, I will encourage them to look after themselves and not rely on a government to improve their lot in life.

[ThroughThickAndThin01]

Yes Im really trying to.

DS1 -19, is away at uni, getting him to vote won't be possible.

Ds2 - 17, 18 in May, was a "remain" then a "leave" then a "can't be arsed to vote, mine won't make any difference.

I'll try and drag him with me.

[mummytime]

Well my DS will be voting, although is less keen for the police commissioner as we have had no info on the candidates. My DD is gutted that she will be just too young, and she believes 16 year olds should be able to vote.
But we all vote, and their cousins are all politically active.

[HappydaysArehere]

Thanks for the replies. It was the EU in out vote than worries me to think that in the future the youngsters will regret not voting when they had the chance. The Mayoral vote is another thing. Difficult to be inspired and not as important.
I can understand howmanyairmails disenchantment in the political scene but at least we have the right to vote and public opinion can often sway a Government. So we can only try to think things out and do our best when we decide in a voting booth.

[scaryteacher]

The young people don't perhaps have the experience and hindsight of their elders. My ds is at uni, and will be home in Brussels for the referendum, but he has his postal vote sorted, and I have my proxy sorted. We are divided on the issue....I know I want out, and have for decades, and ds is undecided.

[ThroughThickAndThin01]

I should think many households are divided scaryteacher . Most people I know are 45/55. It doesn't take much to move that tiny slither of 6% therefore doing an about turn.Some are 100% either way but not many. It's all very close. I should think a lot of families will just be cancelling each other's votes in effect.

I'm an out, think I will vote out on the day, could possibly be swayed though.

[prettybird]

My ds (15) is pissed off that he can't vote next week (Scottish elections), while many of his classmates can but won't bother.

[blueskyinmarch]

My DD’s are 18 and 23 and they always exercise their votes. Always. They are very passionate about this. DD2 was ecstatic to be able to vote in the Scottish referendum at age 16. She was a firm ‘no' for that and is a firm ‘stay’ for the EU referendum.

[YokoUhOh]

I told my Year 13 tutor group that they had a duty to vote in the EU Referendum, as the debate appeared to be dominated by the older generation, many of whom wouldn't live to see the true consequences of Brexit/Bremain. They seemed to be spurred on by this, but this doesn't guarantee that they'll turn up!

[2rebecca]

I don't need to, we're quite a political family and my son is enthusiastic about voting and my daughter keen to vote as soon as she can.

[SlinkyVagabond]

No matter what the issue I've always encouraged my DC to exercise the right to vote-hard won by people in the past.If you don't vote then your complaints about the government mean nothing.

[hidingwithwine]

In Scotland the 16/17 yo's can vote so we've just taken DS1 to vote for the first time. Like his mother he's obsessed with modern studies and politics at school proud so he was desperate to go to the polling station. I fear our wee dusty village hall didn't live up to his expectations

[prettybird]

Ds (too young to vote but lots of his class mates can) commented that the SQA missed a trick: they should have the Modern Studies exam today - a real life example of politics in action.

He's looking forward to being able to vote in next year's council election. Should be interesting in Glasgow!

[ironmaiden999]

No, I will not be asking my children to vote....unless of course they vote my way!

[officerhinrika]

Both mine voted for the PCC despite both thinking the post is a total waste of space. DS1 has a postal vote at University. He says almost all his friends want to remain in the EU and are horrified at the idea that their job options could be massively narrowed by leaving. He is an engineer and already has 2 offers working in Europe. He says they are all convinced that leaving will lead to multinationals disinvesting here and another recession. I guess when you have 4 years of student debt you are a bit less likely to agree to "let's leave and see what happens". He's also very aware of how much European research funding his university gets. His current plan B is, if we vote "leave", a job in Canada for a few years and see what happens from a safe distance!

[prettybird]

Actually, the SQA were quite canny although I'm not sure if it was deliberate - the "close reading" article for Higher English (same day as the Scottish Parliament elections) was by Julia Hartley-Brewer, saying that 16-17 year olds shouldn't be voting.

If they hadn't been intending to vote before the exam, they were afterwards!

Apparently she got quite a lot of Twitter flack for it - she'll have wondered where it was suddenly coming from Huffington post article about it