UKYP HoC 2022

Last Friday, the Members of Youth Parliament (MYPs) took their seats in Westminster to debate issues important to young people.

The House of Commons experience is the highlight of a MYP's term; only MPs are permitted to sit on the green benches and for one day a year, young people are allowed to enter the chamber and hold debates on issues that young people care about.

When I sat in the House in 2019, we had five debates and the MYPs voted on the issues they thought were the priority for young people in the UK. The two prominent issues were 'Protect the Environment' and 'End Knife Crime'. This relates to the context of the year 2019, in which the school climate strikes had been ignited by Greta Thunberg and rallied many young people, including me, to take action. In addition, knife crime was still a key issues especially for the bigger cities, so MYPs wanted to focus the attention onto those areas.

This year, the MYPs have sat for the first time since COVID, and have declared the new priorities as 'The Cost of Living' and 'Health'. In the aftermath of COVID and the recent economic turmoil with inflation at its highest in 40 years, it is no surprise to see that young people have chosen to bring this as the key issue. Young people are often the category ignored as they do not have voting power and therefore do not need to be 'won over' by political parties. However, we are often the most affected by the decisions made, so it is right for the MYPs to have chosen this topic and then bring forward campaigns in the next year to help raise awareness and positively impact the lives of young people.

Youth voice has never been more important - and with the efforts made this time to include the MYPs representing British territories overseas, the chosen topics should be inspiring our youth representatives to feel empowered in speaking to decision-makers and enacting change.

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*Header photo is owned by the author