Unit 1: Should young people be forced to vote?

When we reach the next General Election (scheduled for summer 2015) it is likely that older people will once again be most likely to cast their votes. Voting is not compulsory in the UK, but the evidence suggests that older people are much more likely to exercise their right to vote compared with younger people. So, could this feature of UK election turnout be changed by making voting compulsory for a certain category of voter - the first-time voter?

There are no official figures for voting by age, but a long-running academic study, the British Election Study, provides reasonably consistent survey-based data for General Elections since 1964:

The decline in young people’s engagement in politics is often commented on in the media and the data indicates that voter turnout has been low among young people relative to older age groups. However, in the context of falling overall turnout at General Elections, the decline has been sharpest among voters aged 18-24:

A left-leaning think take - the Institute of Public Policy Research (IPPR) - has just issued a report arguing that young people should be required to turn out at the first election in which they have the right to vote.

The IPPR think tank has said their proposals would involve a small fine for young people deciding not to vote at their first election. They would also offer first-time voters who did not back any political party a "none of the above" option.

Guy Lodge, one of the authors of the IPPR report, has been quoted as saying:

"Unequal turnout matters because it gives older and more affluent voters disproportionate influence at the ballot box. Turnout rates among the young have fallen significantly which means there is less incentive for politicians to pay attention to them."

Is he right? Would the threat of a fine or other punishment be enough to persuade young people to make their way down to the polling station or fill in a postal vote? And if they did, what percentage of the vote would "none of the above get"?

Political commentator Michael White in the Guardian dismisses the IPPR proposal suggesting that the political system should look long and hard at the underlying reasons why turnout is disproportionately low among young people:

"Yes, there is a serious problem of voter disaffection from politics, a process that delegitimises government and hollows out democracy across the developed world. One does not need much imagination to see where that may quickly take us: towards authoritarian populist regimes which erode the all-important rule of law.

This is partly the voters' fault, though pandering politicians rarely say so (and pandering newspapers dare not, for fear of losing readers). If that sounds harsh consider one of the more telling points in today's IPPR report: 44% of 18 to 24-year-olds vote, compared with 76% of over 65s. Guess which group's benefits (the tabloids never admit pensions are benefits) have been protected by the coalition? Right first time."

Making voting compulsory for first-time voters would be just one step towards mandatory voting for the whole electorate. This BBC video looks at the voting system in Australia (where voting is compulsory).