The Minister for Youth, Kate Ellis has written to Special Minister of State, the Hon Senator Faulkner to provide suggestions on increasing civic engagement by young people, specifically civic education and electoral engagement.
In the letter, Minister Ellis highlights issues for canvassing in the Government’s public discussion paper (known as a Green Paper) on electoral reform including:
- increasing engagement of disadvantaged and marginalised people in the electoral process
- introduction of automatic enrolment
- the possibility of lowering the eligible voting age to 16 years old
- electronic voting at polling places to save paper and expedite vote counting.
View Minister Ellis’s letter to Senator Faulkner:
Young people’s civic engagement is vitally important to the success of Australia’s democracy, as emphasised by the Vote for a Better Vote recommendation from the Australia 2020 Youth Summit.
Civic engagement was also discussed at the recent youTHINK forum, held on 20 February 2009. This inaugural Australian Youth Forum (AYF) event was aimed at encouraging young people to speak out on important issues and explore practical solutions. For more information on the AYF, please visit the AYF website.
The second Electoral Reform Green Paper - Strengthening Australia’s Democracy, was released for public consultation on 23 September 2009. Please visit the AYF website for more information on the public consultation process.