What is Make It 16 Month?

This September we encourage all our supporters to come together to do their bit in helping us reach our goal of 10,000 petition signatures by the end of the month.

We’ve noticed that once people start having open kōrero about lowering the voting age and learn about our campaign, they are more likely to support the idea. It’s also local election time, meaning it’s the perfect time for us to be as loud as possible about the fact that 16 year-olds are affected by local decisions too but we can’t vote.

Everything we are doing for this month is to help us increase petition signatures, increase awareness, and start the conversation around lowering the voting age.

What you can do?

Spread awareness in your school or local community. We have pamphlets and posters available to download for you to print off and share. You can find those here.

Start open kōrero with friends and family. We have a Make It 16 Cheat Sheet with the ultimate list of talking points and arguments to use when having an open-minded chat about lowering the voting age.

Encourage your friends and family to sign the petition! This is our number one way to show parliament that people want this change. If everyone who has already signed our petition gets two friends to do the same, we’ll reach 10,000 signatures in no time! You can send them to makeit16.org.nz/petition

Head to local election events and ask candidates if they support lowering the voting age, we want the audience and candidates to see that this is a topical issue - so we need to bring it up during these events as much as possible! We have a list of questions you’re welcome to use. Check out your local council website for events.

Sign up to be a volunteer and join a regional hub to campaign in your local area.

If you’re based in Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington then come join us on the 29th when we hand in our petition on the Parliament steps- we want as many people there as possible so invite your friends too!