Voting age in Lucerne to remain at 18

Young people in Lucerne still only vote at the age of 18 Keystone-SDA

In the Swiss canton of Lucerne, young people are still only allowed to vote from the age of 18. Voters rejected the constitutional initiative on lowering the voting age to 16 on Sunday with 79.1% of votes against.

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A total of 26,242 people voted in favour of lowering the voting age and 99,553 people voted against, the Lucerne chancellery said on Sunday. Voter turnout was 45.12%.

The constitutional initiative was launched by the “young and committed” alliance, which consists of the young parties of the Social Democratic Party, the Green Party, the Liberal Green Party and the Centre Party as well as various organisations and associations.

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The initiative faced opposition from the cantonal government and parliament. The latter rejected it by 63 votes to 48. The Swiss People’s Party, the Centre Party and the Radical-Liberal Party in particular spoke out against the initiative.

Glarus was the first Swiss canton to introduce the voting age of 16. Further attempts to lower the voting age failed at the ballot box in Neuchâtel, Uri, Zurich and Bern. Most recently in canton Aargau, where the electorate rejected the proposal with a 79.7% “no” vote.

Translated from German by DeepL/ts

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