Speech on Bill S-201: The Voting Age Should be Lowered to 16 Because the Future Belongs to the Young

On December 3, 2020 Senator Omidvar gave a speech in support of Bill S-201, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act and the Regulation Adapting the Canada Elections Act for the Purposes of a Referendum (voting age). Watch her speech:

Hon. Ratna Omidvar: Honourable senators, I, too, rise to speak to you on Bill S-201, an Act to amend the Canada Elections Act for the purposes of lowering the voting age from 18 years to 16. I want to commend Senator McPhedran for her persistency on behalf of young people so that they can have a say in our democracy and welcome our efforts in bringing this amendment for the third time to the chamber.

The history of who gets to vote in Canada has never been set in stone. In 1885, only male, property-owning, British subjects aged 21 and older were eligible to vote. Today, all Canadian citizens aged 18 or older, regardless of gender, income or ethnic origin have the right to vote. Evolution has been at the heart of electoral law.

However, every time voter eligibility has evolved, objections have been raised. For example, before some women were enfranchised in 1918, Senator Hewitt Bostock argued that:

. . . women will be put in the position of receiving something that they do not appreciate, and consequently very probably they will not exercise their right to vote.

I’m sure many women cringe when they read and hear this point of view. I have heard many similar arguments against lowering the voting age to 16.

Instead of telling you the virtues associated with this idea, let me deal with the objections to it.

The first objection is that young people are too young to deal with complex matters such as voting. Plus, they are so young that we cannot reasonably expect them to make informed choices. In addition, their brains are not sufficiently developed at 16 to enable them to make logical choices. And, finally, what would be the point in any case, since young people would only vote the way their parents tell them to?

In other words, they are too young, too immature, too impressionable, too inexperienced to be granted the most valuable right of citizens: the ability to cast a vote.

Instead of giving you just my opinion, let me share the evidence from jurisdictions that have lowered the voting age.

In 2007, Austria enfranchised those aged 16 and older. There is a 13-year body of evidence to draw from. What the data tells us is that the turnout among 16- and 17-year-old Austrian voters has not been substantially lower than the overall turnout rate. Evidently, young people will vote if they are given the opportunity.

Let’s deal with the objection related to immaturity.

Young people cannot be entrusted with the vote because they will make uninformed choices. If given the vote, they may cast their vote for the sake of voting without understanding the implications of the choices they are making. They don’t have enough political knowledge and are not able to tune in to the political discourse of the day. Honourable senators, frankly, if this holds true for young people, I would submit it holds true for many adults as well.

Once again, I looked to countries that have enfranchised youth to determine if this argument holds water. A study conducted in Austria before the 2009 European Parliament election showed that young people voted based on their political preferences just as much as older voters. They were not ignorant of the context — quite the opposite. They had distinct political preferences which they exercised through their vote.

Then there’s the argument that adolescent brains cannot manage the logical processes required for voting, even though they can drive cars. They can join the reserves. They can work. They can pay taxes. But apparently they cannot manage the logical processes required for voting.

According to neuroscientists, in scenarios where tasks are mainly cognitive, adolescents show competence levels comparable to those of adults. This means that when the level of stress is low and there is time to evaluate different choices, young people can make thoughtful decisions. Because voting is an activity that teenagers — and in fact all of us — can think about ahead of time, they are able to make just as reasonable decisions as adult voters.

Finally, regarding parental influence, people ask, “What’s the point of allowing young people to vote, since they will surely vote the way their parents tell them to?” I don’t know about your children, colleagues, but in my family the opposite is almost always true. Kids have perspectives, they have priorities, they have opinions, and they don’t hesitate to tell us — especially us parents — what is wrong with our world. Plus, the influence does not go one way. Young people can and do affect their parents’ civic engagement and attitudes as well. My children have been instrumental in influencing me about global warming and climate change.

Additionally, there are other reasons to look seriously at this proposal. It will have a positive impact on electoral participation in the long run. This is because young people under 18 are most likely to still be in school and to live with their families — two factors that have been shown to encourage voter turnout. In the long term, this higher level of participation at a young age, may then facilitate the development of a lifelong habit of voting. As Rick Mercer, he of the famous rants, has said, “Voting is learned behaviour and it is addictive.” I am a big proponent of lowering the voting age to 16 because we know if people start voting, they will continue to vote their entire life.

It is also important to consider the impact allowing younger people to vote can have on their families, for those young people whose families are not politically engaged. Learning how to vote at school or in their community may help them to empower their family members to vote with them. Youth can be and are incredible behavioural change agents.

We make decisions in this chamber that have significant impacts on the lives of young people — decisions about cannabis, the labelling of food, assisted death, slave labour in our supply chains and, of course, climate change. A common complaint I hear from young people is that the older political elites control their future. Giving them the right to vote at this age will ensure that we hear their views and take them seriously.

Even though I have frequently referred to Austria as one of the jurisdictions that has enfranchised young people, I would also add that the voting age is 16 in Scotland, Brazil, Argentina, Cuba, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Malta, Jersey, Guernsey, Wales and the Isle of Man. There are also several countries where 16-year-olds can vote in certain regional or municipal elections, including Germany, Switzerland, Estonia and the United States. The idea of allowing young people to vote should not seem so unrealistic, considering it is already taking place in many parts of the world.

Young people are campaigning for the right to vote in not only federal elections in Canada but also provincial and municipal elections. The Vote16BC campaign has received broad support, gaining endorsement from the City of Vancouver, the Union of B.C. Municipalities, and the B.C. Teachers’ Federation, among many others. The Samara Centre for Democracy finds that beyond voting, young people are the most active participants in Canada’s civic and political life. They talk about politics more than anyone, are present in the formal political sphere, respond through activism and are leading their communities through civic engagement. Whatever happens at the ballot box, political leaders overlook the passion and engagement of young people at their own peril. It therefore makes sense to leverage this enthusiasm for politics into the ballot box.

I don’t want to make the argument for lowering the voting age without linking it with civic education. I don’t believe you can do one without doing the other. For example, in Austria, the lowering of the voting age was accompanied by awareness-raising campaigns and enhancing the status of civic and citizenship education in schools. In terms of citizenship education, all provinces and territories include this subject area in their curriculums. Some provinces, including Ontario, British Columbia, and Quebec, have even created separate civics or citizenship courses. The foundation for leveraging civic education in our system already exists.

Perhaps the best way to conclude my speech is to look to the future. It is young people who will inherit the future, uncertain as it is. It is young people who will live with the results of our choices today. It is young people who will need to fix the mistakes older generations have made. Lord knows, we have made many, and we will likely make many more. It only makes sense to let them into the ballot box, because the future is rightly theirs, not ours. Colleagues, let’s send this bill to committee for thorough study as soon as we are able to. Thank you.