Will more young people head to the polls next month?
A new Ipsos poll, conducted for La Presse, indicates that 81 per cent of 18 to 25-year-olds plan to vote in the upcoming Quebec election.
If the numbers hold true, the turnout among youths will be much higher than the traditional turnout of around 60 per cent in Quebec.
READ MORE: Poll shows Liberals leading Quebec youth vote
There are numerous reasons to explain why the voting turnout among young people doesn’t match that of the general population: a lack of interest in politics, political party leaders don’t address the concerns of the youth and young people don’t think their vote will make a difference.
“I don’t really keep up with this kind of stuff and I’m not really, like, informed about the subject well enough to vote I think,” Dina Kammourie, a first-year McGill University student, told Global News.
With the provincial election campaign a little past the halfway mark, a symposium at the Palais des Congrès was held all day Thursday to study issues that could attract more young people to the polls.
READ MORE: What do English-speaking millenials want out of the upcoming Quebec election?
One expert says it often takes a major political crisis to mobilize the youth such as the 9/11 attacks in New York City or the Oka Crisis.
“Of course I would like more people to vote and maybe they will in the long term,” said Anne-Marie Gingras, a UQAM professor.
“We have to take care of them. We have to talk to them.”
Erik Enhorning, a third-year McGill student, says he plans on doing his homework before voting.
“I am going to go home and research a bit more because I would like to vote,” he said. “I want to be part of that.”
READ MORE: ‘Our vote doesn’t make a difference’: More focus needed on Indigenous concerns in Quebec campaign
The Ipsos poll was conducted from Aug. 31 to Sept. 6, 2018 among 510 young adults, aged between 18 and 25.
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