Blair Kapa-Peters (right) at Waitangi sharing a hongi with Lamarr Oksasikewiyin, a teacher from Chief Little Pine School on a Cree reservation in Canada during Waitangi Day celebrations in 2018.
Blair Kapa-Peters (right) at Waitangi sharing a hongi with Lamarr Oksasikewiyin, a teacher from Chief Little Pine School on a Cree reservation in Canada during Waitangi Day celebrations in 2018.
New Zealand's voting age should be lowered to 16 to boost local government election youth voting, according to a Far North-based UNESCO Aotearoa Youth Leader.
"Lowering New Zealand's voting age to 16 would definitely boost youth participation in local government elections," Blair Kapa-Peters (Te Aupouri/Te Rarawa) said.
Her comments come after New Zealand's next national election date was announced as September 19.
"It should be lowered. That would then create a push for schools to teach politics," Kapa-Peters said.
In-school teaching about politics and democracy would help young people understand how democracy worked, leading to greater numbers of young people voting.
She said schools' political education would offer young people opportunities to develop their own voting views – as opposed to simply voting the way their parents and whanau did because that was all they knew.
Kapa-Peters, 25, who lives in Kaitaia, was appointed to New Zealand's UNESCO Aotearoa Youth Leaders group in late December. She attended her first meeting of the UNESCO group in Wellington on January 25, now participating in two areas - global citizenship education and indigenous climate change knowledge.
Community and democracy have long been part of Kapa-Peters' life.
She comes from Te Kao, just 45 kilometres south of Cape Reinga. Growing up on Potahi Marae at Te Kao gave her early and ongoing awareness of community and democracy in action.
"I used to love sitting and listening to what was being talked about," Kapa-Peters said.
Her first job out of school was working at Te Runanga o Te Rarawa's Kaitaia office where she was encouraged to become a Far North District Council Youth Council member.
"I didn't really want to at first, because I thought that it wasn't going to be cool - but it was," she said.
"It was the first time the (Far North District Council – FNDC) council had created a youth council. I had no experience of working with local government ever before or even really knowing much of what council was about.
"I was sceptical at first, but being on the youth council opened up all these other opportunities."
Kapa-Peters represented FNDC's Te Hiku ward on the youth council, with the group from the age of 20 to 24 when she reached its upper age participation limit.
The youth council worked to create a sense of connection between everyday people and FNDC.
Lowering the voting age would get more people voting, Far North-based UNESCO Aotearoa Youth Leader Blair Kapa-Peters says.
Kapa-Peters encouraged New Zealand youth to get involved in their local youth councils.
She said youth council members should aspire to participate in full council strategy meetings so that youth were at the table, could see future decision making in action and were part of that.
But doing so created challenges – such meetings were during the day when many youth council members were at school.
Kapa-Peters' FNDC youth council membership lead to other connections with travel around New Zealand and beyond. In 2018 she went to the Artenzeno craft festival in Italy where she talked about traditional Māori games.
In 2017 she received the Kiwibank local hero award for efforts in the environmental area and for her youth work.
The youth community leader has worked in community and environmental development since 2015 organising avian avoidance workshops, dog control strategies, recognising and preventing kauri dieback's spread plus kiwi advocacy awareness. She promotes native flora and fauna preservation including through schools, community clubs, marae and online.
Kapa-Peters was also member of New Zealand's Inspiring Stories Trust's future leaders' programme. This trust supports young people in small communities to develop social enterprise.
She currently works as a youth navigator at Kaitaia-based Building Safer Communities (a non-governmental organisation connected with organisations including the New Zealand Police and ACC) supporting the community into greater social and economic wellbeing. Her mahi includes working around sexual health, sexual violence and dating violence plus youth innovation and social enterprise.
Kapa-Peters said she could never have imagined as a five-year-old starting school she would end up working in the areas she operates in today. But she loves it.
Her next goal is to stand for FNDC's local Te Hiku Community Board in the 2022 local body elections.
As for other young people around New Zealand and participating in local democracy?
"Don't be afraid of council and be open. Lots of people think council is this huge untouchable thing. At the end of the day they're people like us so don't be afraid to engage with them."
