Claire Dickson

Northern Ireland has seen lower turnouts than the rest of the UK across the previous four general elections and the Brexit referendum with only around half of eligible voters voting in the recent council election.

The Scoop spoke to two students, who wished to remain anonymous, who chose not to vote in this year’s council election. One student attends QUB and the other attends a university across the water. What follows is an overview of why they didn’t feel motivated to go to the polls and raises questions about wider voter apathy in Northern Ireland.

Had they voted before?

The student at the university across the water voted in last year’s assembly election but upon moving to university this year didn’t vote in the council election. She “wasn’t able to vote at home and didn’t organise voting another day” citing lack of interest/complacency as one of the primary reasons for that.

What would have motivated them to vote in the council election?

In the eyes of the student I spoke to at university across the water, it is the stop-start nature of the executive which will now deter her from voting across all types of election. She added: “I would have been more motivated to vote if I thought my vote would make a difference in Northern Ireland, where Stormont is constantly not working properly anyway, no matter who is in charge.”

The student at QUB felt that candidates in his local area could have done more to encourage going to the polls.

“In my local area the candidates were not engaged enough with canvassing.” Additionally, he feels that once candidates are elected to council, not enough progress is made across their time in office owing to careerist intentions.

“I would have been motivated to vote if I thought the candidates would genuinely have tried to improve the quality of life of the average citizen in the area; I feel that an increase in careerist politics has left the sense of giving back to your community out of politics because they are so career motivated.”

What are the issues surrounding voter apathy amongst young people?

The student currently studying at QUB feels that young people in a more general sense may not feel motivated to vote in council elections over here as “most young people do not use services the council would provide to the same extent as an older person – voter turnout in most elections in the UK is shockingly low between both youth and adult voters, the highest voter turnout from the electorate in the UK was over Brexit and even then only 70 per cent of eligible citizens voted – if a big issue like Brexit has 30 per cent of the electorate not participating I feel that it would be very hard to convince young people to actively take politics more seriously.”

So for these students to go to the polls in future elections it seems it will take more active campaigning on the part of candidates, less complacency and less of a stop-start nature to governance here amongst other things. Whether those issues remain by December 2024’s general election remains to be seen.

Voter apathy in Northern Ireland: the student perspective