Giving young people the vote would make them more engaged in society

Currently many young people are deprived of democratic participation until they are 23. Opening up voting to 16 and 17 year olds would ensure that they get the opportunity to vote from a younger age and it is more likely to be seen as an essential element of the transition to adulthood. 18 year olds are often more transient – they are more likely to be leaving home, working full time or starting university. At this busy time of life voting can all too easily drop down the list of priorities.

The exclusion of 16 and 17 year olds from elections is fuelling the disengagement of 18-24 year olds. The longer young people are denied involvement in the formal democratic process, the less chance there is of engaging them ever. There is no evidence to suggest that once 18, young people are likely to become more engaged.

It is a logical fallacy to suggest that if 18 year olds, who are affected by a wider array of political issues, such as employment law, universities etc. are not engaged with the political process, then those of a younger age will be.

If we're having trouble getting those who are allowed to vote to actually vote, then the solution is to give them better reasons to do so: by increasing the prevalence of political education, by forcing parties to start appealing to the whole electorate, to empower the public so as to make them believe they can change politics, and perhaps even to change the electoral system to make our parliaments better reflect the public opinion. 
opinion. 
 
there is no evidence to suggest that 16-17 yr olds care about voting there was never a survey or a census and to say that the exclusion of TEENS is affecting how adults vote then you are mistaken my parents never said gee son since you can't vote Im not going to vote 18-24yr olds want to vote they can if not thats their choice and it's not going to change because they had a field trip and voted when they were teens