NATALIE Bennett, Green Party leader, is delighted to be taking part in Bite the Ballot’s leaders live event, a unique opportunity to engage with young people and make the political sphere more accessible to a wider audience.
Bite the Ballot is a youth organisation that inspires young people to become more involved in democracy. The Green Party is excited to be involved in the event that will be streamed live on Bite News on the evening of 26th November. (1)
Responding to the invitation to be a part of this event, Bennett said:
“It is great to have this chance to reach a wide range of voters who might not usually engage with traditional politics in newspapers or broadcast media, particularly younger voters.
“Interviews, like this, that stream live online are fantastic because they allow voters to have direct contact with their politicians.
Young Greens, the youth organisation of the Green Party, have seen an unprecedented growth of 165% in nine months alone. There are now 65 Green youth groups in England and Wales (2).
The Green Party offers a progressive alternative to the tribal, business-as-usual party politics that young voters are increasingly disillusioned with.
Bennett added:
“The economy is failing to provide enough jobs for people to build a life on, jobs that pay the living wage and offer a fair degree of security. That is one of the huge failures of our current economic and political systems. Unpaid internships, zero-hours contracts and failure to provide full-time jobs for those who need them are hitting young workers particularly hard.
"The Green Party offers an alternative. On education, for example, I find that our support for free education at all levels is very popular. But possibly even more popular is our call to stop our education system acting like a sausage machine, shoving young people through exam after exam, forcing teachers to 'teach to the test'. We say that education instead should be broad, preparing students for life, including extensive coverage of sex and relationship education, personal finance, democracy, cooking and food growing, among other practical skills."
NOTES:
1) Bite News will stream the leaders live event on the 26th November 6pm-8pm,http://www.youtube.com/user/bitenews/about
2) Young Greens, http://younggreens.org.uk/