Based on what evidence? Personally I find it hard to believe that while a person's general political views may naturally change over time they won't with regard to the European Union and they will remain just as idealistic. If you're theory is right it would mean that over time the general population would become more europhile. In fact the opposite is true, and over the last 10 to 20 years the general public has become more eurosceptic.Originally Posted by Mike T
As you say it is a matter of opinion. Personally I think 16 is too young. After all we don't allow people to drink alcohol or get married without permission until they are 18. The overwhelming majority of countries around the world set 18 as the minimum age for voting in national elections. If we were to change it then we should make the decision for all UK elections not just for specific ones for reasons of political gain for one side. I don't remember there being the same clamour to alter the voting age before the last general election.As to the voting age it is of course just a matter of opinion, but I think 16 and 17 year olds should be able to vote - it would be part of their education and give them a sense of responsibility, and, after all, education issues affect them more than the rest of us.
It's a free country, you're perfectly entitled to not like the result of an election. What would be a scandal however would be if those in positions of power were to overturn the will of the electorate.We don't have to accept the result of an election we do not like, we can hope for a vote of no confidence/lots of defectors to the opposition and so on - and that is in a situation where we will vote again in 5 years time at the most. The Brexit result is dodgy on so many levels - how vague does a referendum have to be, how low can the turn out be, and how many blatant lies have to have been told before the result should be declared null and void and the whole referendum question clarified and repeated?
It's a reasonable point that you make that in most elections we get the opportunity to change our minds in five years time. Obviously in a referendum like this that is impractical.
In fact those voting in the last referendum on the EU in 1975 had to wait 41 years before having an opportunity to vote again and most of us have never had a say on the EU at all. The referendum was long overdue not least because the EU is such a different animal from what it was in 1975 when it was little more than a trading bloc. Since then successive Governments have given away sovereignty without ever allowing the electorate a say - sometimes promising a referendum on a treaty and then reneging on the promise as the Labour Government so shamefully did after 2005.
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