Young Election Candidates In Drive To Increase Youth Voter Registration

Two of the youngest candidates standing for East Riding Council in the upcoming May elections have launched a campaign to encourage young people in the East Riding to register and vote.

Labour’s Ben Cooper (age 20) and Matthew Lloyd (age 24) have written personal letters to all the young people aged 18 – 25 in some of the key wards they are hoping to represent.

With the change in the rules for voter registration, which require young people to register themselves rather than relying on automatic registration based on information gathered from the head of household, there has been a worrying fall in the number of voters on the electoral roll, especially in Beverley and Holderness.

In their letter, Ben and Matthew, urge other young people to engage with the political process:

“Young people have been ignored for far too long. Because we’re less likely to vote, politicians have been comfortable in ignoring our demands and wishes. We can’t let that happen in 2015!”

A student of politics at Hull University, Ben Cooper, who is standing in his own ward of St Mary’s in Beverley, said: “Politics, especially local government, has been dominated by older people for far too long. We need some fresh voices and fresh faces and to make young people feel they have a say in the kinds of decisions that affect their lives on a day-to-day basis.”

Matthew Lloyd, who already serves on Withernsea Town Council, hopes the letter will encourage young people like him to take an active interest in politics, most especially in voting in what is likely to be one of the closest elections in recent history.

“We are the first generation in a hundred years who will experience lower living standards than our parents. The promise that the previous generation leaves a country with more opportunities and greater prosperity for the next one has been broken. The consequences of this are huge for all of us, and we need councillors who understand this.”

The letters, some 3000 in total, are being hand-delivered by volunteers across four wards in Beverley and Holderness in order to arrive before the deadline for voter registration closes on 21 April.

Labour’s Parliamentary Candidate for Beverley & Holderness, Margaret Pinder, who has been visiting schools and colleges in the constituency urging young people to register to vote and explaining how politics matters to them, was full of praise for the initiative.

“It is absolutely essential that as many people as possible turn out and vote in May, and the more young people who register and vote, the more representative the outcome will be. This is the message I have been taking to them on a non-party political basis. Obviously I hope their vote will come to Labour, but it is important for democracy that they engage with the political process at the earliest opportunity whatever their decision at the ballot box.”