Next year all young people will have to remain in education, full or part time, until the age of 18. Clearly they are not regarded as adult for they will be expected to accept direction from others. They will not be allowed to enter into employment on the basis of an independent agreement with an employer as adults do.
So why is David Cameron prepared to accept the lowering of the voting age in Scotland? Are young people suddenly growing up at a younger age? Are schools preparing young people much more effectively for adult life, or can some politicians see an advantage in getting at younger people, and their votes?
Two generations ago we could leave school at fourteen. Then we had to wait another seven years before we could vote, at twenty-one. If some politicians have their way young people will be able to vote before they leave school, before, and this I think is crucial, before they have had a taste of full responsibility for their own lives, in other words, before they have grown up. If this argument sounds familiar it is because we hear it in complaints about a political class at Westminster that has never been anywhere else or done anything else, has never grown up and is out of touch with ordinary people’s lives.
Can we now expect the age at which we can drive being lowered? Insurers would go into melt-down. What about the age of consent? Fourteen? Twelve?
We should spare young people further pressure, pressure to get an education, to spend money on their parents’ behalf – advertisers know about this – and pressure to follow the crowd. We should allow young people to grow up, to be daft and silly, to make mistakes and grow out of childhood and encourage them to think for themselves and find their grown up selves.
We cannot oblige young people to grow up, neither should we prevent them.