Representation of the People (Young People’s Enfranchisement and Education) Bill

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Friday 3rd November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow soon after the evidence-packed speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin). I had come here today to have a serious debate about a complex and difficult issue that we have to examine from time to time, but I was disappointed by the boorish approach of the Bill’s promoter, the hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton (Jim McMahon), who sought to create division in the House rather than to be persuasive. Over the past few years, I could possibly have been persuaded on this issue, but I have certainly not been today. I therefore speak in opposition to the Bill, because it kicks off a process about which we should be concerned.

As far as I can see, the Bill confuses the complex issue of capacity—what young people should be able to do, what they are capable of doing and what we should allow them to do. This is a complicated and difficult area that a number of us in public policy have struggled with over the past two decades. The problem with the Bill is that it works against the broad thrust of public policy around young people over the past two decades.

For instance, it is generally accepted that gambling is bad for young people, in recognition of the two stages of brain development in young people: the first prior to six, when 95% of the brain is formed, and the second during adolescence, when enormous changes take place and when we have to take extreme care over how young people develop. The science is with us on this. This is a period when the operation of the brain, people’s practice and habits, are formed. It is important that we look at that. It was decided some years ago that forbidding under-18s to gamble was desirable in order to inculcate and educate and to get their brains functioning in a way that meant they were less likely to do it in older age. The Bill would create the ridiculous situation whereby a young person could vote but not then place a wager on the outcome of the election in which they had just voted, which seems extraordinary.

There are all manner of areas where the same would be the case, which is of concern to those of us who have worked closely with charities in this area such as the Children’s Society, which identifies 16 and 17-year-olds as a particularly vulnerable group who require protection.

[Mrs Sheryll Murray]

My hon. Friend has used a very good example. Does he agree that another might be the purchase and consumption of alcohol? We have also increased the age at which people can purchase cigarettes. Such important changes have been proved beneficial to people’s health.

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend makes a strong point.

[Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)]

Is the hon. Gentleman seriously suggesting that voting at 16 or 17 is bad for people’s health—besides voting for the Tory party?

[Kit Malthouse]

I think the hon. Gentleman knows that that is exactly what I am not saying; the main thrust of my concern is that the Bill kicks off an inevitable process that might expose 16 and 17-year-olds to harm. I cannot see how we can give someone the vote at 16 and then deny them all the other capabilities and abilities of adulthood.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

Did my hon. Friend, like me, see the reported comments by the hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton (Jim McMahon)— he could have told us if they were not true, but he appears to have disappeared from his own debate—in trying to explain away the comments of his then hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Jared O'Mara)? He said that he was young and silly and too immature to know any better—when he was in his 20s. And this is the man who is now proposing a Bill to reduce the voting age to 16. Does my hon. Friend see some inconsistencies between those approaches?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend rightly puts his finger on the broad point I am trying to make, which is that the Bill injects yet more inconsistency into an already confusing area of public policy—one where a number of Governments have struggled and where lacunae have opened up, exposing young people to harm and developmental experiences that might not be in their best interests. This is part of the problem. I would have more respect for the Bill and the hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton had he tried to bring some regularity, logic and evidence to this, rather than just assertion and emotion.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

I have commanded an infantry battalion going on operations, and I have had soldiers plead with me to allow them to come. They were 17 years and three quarters, and I had to turn them down—because the law said that no one under 18 should go to war. I agree with that. I do not agree with 16-year-olds being able to send over-18s to war but not being able to go themselves.

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. and gallant Friend makes a strong point. We must think carefully in this House about the consequences of what might seem like relatively small legislative changes. For instance, I cannot see how we can give the vote to a 16-year-old and deny them the ability to buy a knife, drink alcohol, buy cigarettes, buy fireworks, watch an “18” film, access pornography, leave school, get a tattoo, access credit, and get a mortgage, a property or a tenancy. They cannot do jury service, be a magistrate or a councillor. Critically and possibly most importantly, how can we give someone a vote in an election in which they are not themselves able to stand as a Member of Parliament?

[Mrs Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

As my hon. Friend knows I am a passionate advocate of no taxation without representation. Does he agree that it is perhaps time to consider stopping the taxation of those under 18 whom we wish to stay in education or training, which is part of the policy that he talks about?

[Kit Malthouse]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. As I have said repeatedly, this House needs to look at this issue in a much wider context and much more consistently. Members have jumped up and down in this place—I have heard them time and again—talking about greater protections for 16 and 17-year-olds. The problem with extending the franchise to them is how we maintain the idea that they are still somehow a second-class citizen having made them a first-class citizen through allowing them to vote.

The latest protection we have seen is around the rise of e-cigarettes. This House decided in its wisdom that people under 18 could not buy e-cigarettes—they are not allowed to vape. More than that, adults are not allowed to use an e-cigarette or smoke in a car with somebody who is 16 or 17 because it is bad for their health. I just do not see how, logically, we can maintain that position. We can give someone the vote and they may vote for somebody who will campaign and enact legislation that will bring those harmful things to bear on them. That is the fundamental inconsistency.

A number of Members have talked about gradations of development. It is certainly true that different people develop at different times. We all know that the brain develops strongly during adolescence. It starts at the back and moves to the front. Those who are medically minded will know that the science proves that. Our system of capacity has evolved over the years to recognise that we have different capacity at different ages. This whole idea is illogical and makes no sense to me. I welcome the idea that we should decide on a line, but we should level everything up to it, and for me that age is 18. As my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex said, 18 is generally accepted across the world and we should have the same.

[James Cartlidge]

My hon. Friend is making a very good speech. His tone of reasonableness and balance is a big contrast to what we heard at the start of this debate. If we level everything, that would include the age of consent with all its implications. Is he also saying that we should remove national insurance payments from the under-18s, and that if we keep them those under-18s must have a say?

[Kit Malthouse]

No. Under-18s should not participate in the taxation system at all. Many are low paid and do not. There is only a very small number who pay tax. In broader social policy terms, because they are among the lower paid, they should not necessarily pay tax as other people do. The current system is very confusing. It indicates that at some stages they are adults, and at others they are not. That might be a reflection of reality: those who have lived with a teenager will know that from time to time they appear mature and then, for no possible explanation, they will be illogical, impulsive or emotional. That is part of the developmental process through they are going through.

[Caroline Lucas]

Is the hon. Gentleman actually listening to some of the arguments he is making? To be honest, his side of the argument is sounding increasingly desperate. It really reached a nadir when the hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) said that we should not have 16-year-olds sending people to fight because they cannot fight themselves. On the same principle, presumably people over the age of 65 should not be able to vote either, because they are not going out to fight. Will the hon. Gentleman please be at least a little bit more reasonable?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am not desperate particularly; I am just trying to illustrate to the House that we need to take care with the process we are kicking off. If we allowed 16 and 17-year-olds to have the vote, it would become much harder to place restrictions on what they are able to do, what people can expose them to and what their capacity is.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a cool, calm and logical speech. It is a shame that Opposition Members are not affording him the courtesy of a fair hearing. Did he, like me, read the article by our hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince), who spotted some inherent contradictions from the Opposition? The Labour party raised the age limit from 16 to 18 for all sorts of things—some sensible, some less sensible and some peculiar, such as the legislation on sunbeds.

[Kit Malthouse]

Absolutely right. It was a remarkably good article, which I recommend that everybody read. It points to this issue of policy confusion. There will be Labour Members shouting at me today about lowering the age of the franchise to 16 who actually voted to stop these very people lying on sunbeds. My hon. Friend is exactly right. The problem at the crux of this is that it is not as simple as extending the franchise. There is a much wider policy framework that we must consider. We cannot extend the franchise and still deny all the baubles of adulthood to people whom we have allowed the vote when they are 16 and 17.

[Wes Streeting (Ilford North) (Lab)]

I rise today as an honorary president of the British Youth Council, a former president of the National Union of Students and—just about—a millennial. I will be brief because people watching this debate should know that there is a desperate attempt to prevent people from moving to a vote on this motion. I want to nail the fallacy that young people aged 16 and 17 do not have the maturity to vote. We have already heard about the things that 16 and 17-year-olds can do, but we have heard voting compared with gambling, drugs and alcohol. Now, I know that it is customary for Government Members to gamble with the country’s future when they put their Bills forward. In fact, people sometimes look at various Government policies and wonder whether people have been taking drugs when producing them.

[Kit Malthouse]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I just want your advice on whether it is in order for the hon. Gentleman to misrepresent what I said in my speech. He said that I was comparing granting the vote to 16 and 17-year-olds with gambling, which I absolutely was not. I was merely saying what I was saying, and I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman was obviously not listening to what I was saying. He is my colleague on the Treasury Committee and normally does listen to what I have to say, albeit with a grin, but—[Interruption.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. I have the gist of the hon. Gentleman’s point, which is not a point of order; it is a point of debate. The hon. Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) is interpreting what the hon. Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse) said, and there is disagreement with the hon. Gentlemen. That is what I would expect in a debate of this kind. The hon. Member for North West Hampshire might have an opportunity to put the record straight about what he said, but it will be in Hansard for everyone to read.