“There is only one thing surprising about the Federal Government’s plan to close the electoral roll as soon as the next election is called, and thus prevent tens of thousands of young Australians from voting. And that is that someone in government actually remembered young people do vote in this country.”

“At the 2001 election, 83,000 first-time voters signed up in the first seven days of the campaign. This month the Coalition, citing spurious concerns about electoral fraud, said it wants to prevent the same situation occurring this election. (Read: wants to stop some likely supporters of non-Coalition parties from casting a vote.)
In all, about 2.5 million Australians are aged 15 to 24 – not an insignificant number. As a demographic, though, they are increasingly crushed and buried beneath an ageing population – beneath 12.5 million voters, all of us shouting ourselves silly about real estate, retirement, superannuation plans and other issues as grey and lifeless as a politician’s suit.” (Age)
How can they get away with that? Great list of questions though:
“Which of our politicians can answer the following questions?
* What’s it like to know that no amount of education will guarantee you stable employment?
* What’s it like to hear everyone talking about security, and yet feel so insecure?
* What’s it like to begin adulthood in debt?
* What’s it like to be gay, knowing your Prime Minister would be disappointed if his child was the same?
* What’s it like to feel priced out of higher education because you lucked out in a generational lottery?
* What’s it like to know you will pay rent forever?
* What’s it like to know your generation is exhibiting signs of depression up to 10 times that of previous generations?
* And what’s it like to know that the current Government would rather you were off the electoral roll than on it?”