A school’s recent mock Scottish referendum shows the wisdom of engaging children in politics from a young age

Manchester Grammar School recently held a mock referendum on Scottish independence, in which ‘No’ won a more resounding victory than it managed on October 18th. The head of Politics at the school, Richard Kelly, argues that the event was worthwhile despite not having any bearing on anything in particular, in that it showed the importance of engaging children in democracy from a young age, teaching them skills that could be worthwhile if direct democracy is to become a bigger feature of the political landscape.

Voting materiel? Credit: Nicolas Alejandro, CC BY 2.0

One of the sternest complaints against the recent Scottish referendum was that it disenfranchised voters in most of the UK – even though all UK voters were affected by the result (see, for example, the Spectator 13 September). Indeed, one of the most telling arguments made by ‘no’ campaigners was that the Scots who most benefited from Union – viz. those living in parts of it beyond Scotland – were excluded from the ballot. It was, perhaps, rather like holding a referendum on the state’s approach to unemployment, while excluding those who were employed.

Here at Manchester Grammar School, we were strongly aware of this irony. Several members of our staff are Scottish, as are quite a few of our pupils’ parents: not hugely surprising, of course, given that we are in England’s principal northern city. Furthermore, at MGS we take our political science seriously. The subject is taught as part of our A-Level and International Baccalaureate programmes while, among ex-students now doing BA degrees, Politics is second only to History in terms of popularity. In view of all this, the case for organising our own ‘mock referendum’ on Scottish independence seemed pretty strong.

This referendum, held on the same day as the poll in Scotland, duly involved approximately 1500 pupils (aged 7-18), 150 members of the teaching staff and about 100 members of the non-teaching staff. As such, we believe Manchester Grammar School became the only community outside Scotland where a significant number of people– comparable to the size of a reputable opinion poll – had the chance to vote on this first-order political issue.

In the fortnight leading up to polling day, the campaign was driven by two teams drawn from the ranks of our A-Level Politics students, each advocating a ‘yes’ and ‘no’ vote respectively, each comprising students hoping to read Politics at university. We gather that, within the ‘yes’ campaign, there was nobody who actually believed in Scottish independence. But for the students concerned, it was still intellectually useful to advocate and develop arguments they did not support personally.

The campaign consisted of four school assemblies, in which all the School’s students were treated to ‘yes’ and ‘no’ arguments from the two campaign teams. At the same time, both campaigns aimed to make our students realise they were living through remarkable times. They accordingly became aware that, in western Europe, it was just not normal to live in a state that was poised to implode; a point that seemed to spark a good deal of debate across all age groups. Members of our Junior Politics Society, for example, worked out that the UK thus had something in common with Iraq, Syria, Somalia, Ukraine, Bangladesh and the Democratic Republic of the Congo – all of which they described as ‘unstable places’. (Predictably, these students have since expressed an interest in studying A-Level Politics.)

Manchester Grammar School Referendum: The Full Breakdown of Results

On polling day itself, the School’s main hall was converted into a polling station, with everyone able to cast a vote during the course of the school day. Balloting was arranged along ‘constituency’ lines, thus enabling us to monitor and differentiate voting behaviour in specific sections of the School (Years 3-6, Years 7-8, Years 9-11, Sixth Form, staff). Unlike in Scotland, there was also a significant amount of ‘exit’ polling conducted by particularly geek-ish Politics students, keen to discover any relationship between voter choice and, say, religion or ethnicity (none was found).

Turnout was brisk, and eventually reached 64%: comparable to turnout in our mock general election of 2010, and 20% higher than in our mock referendum on AV three years earlier. Especially notable was the level of participation among our boys of primary school age, where turnout was 100% (with a complete absence of spoilt ballot papers). By contrast, turnout among staff was the lowest of all (with a few spoilt ballot papers to boot).

Few were surprised that the result was a clear victory for the ‘no’ campaign, or that the result was more emphatic than in Scotland itself. Nevertheless, it was remarkable that, in this tiny corner of Greater Manchester, no fewer than 281 people voted to end the United Kingdom – including almost 100 boys aged between 7 and 13 (according to sixth form psephologists, only one of them was Scottish-born).

One clear similarity with Scotland was that support for independence was most marked among sixth formers; in other words, those aged between 16 and 18. A staggering 39% of our sixth formers voted ‘yes’, for reasons that went well beyond adolescent nihilism. Exit polling suggested that, among our 16-18 year olds, there was a surprising contempt towards London and ‘the south’, which fuelled sympathy for Scottish separatism. This being an all-boys school in Manchester, their bias might reflect some visceral hostility towards organisations like Chelsea FC. However, there might also have been a link to the fact that, after graduation, many of our students quickly gravitate back north to pursue careers in law, medicine, accountancy etc. So the strong support among our Politics students for ‘devo-Manc‘ (a notion unveiled by Philip Blond a few days after the referendum) seemed consistent with the result of the referendum itself.

Even though its outcome had no practical effect whatsoever, the MGS referendum on Scottish independence seemed a worthy exercise in political participation and political education. In respect of our younger voters, it might also prove useful training for the politics of the future. If Douglas Carswell and Daniel Hannan are right, and Britain’s future democracy will indeed be more ‘direct’, it might be wise to start training future voters from a young age. Here at MGS, the case for lowering the voting age to 7 looks utterly compelling.

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Note: this post originally appeared on the PSA blog and is reposted with the permission of the blog editor. It represents the views of the author and not those of Democratic Audit or the LSE. Please read our comments policy before posting.

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Richard Kelly is Head of Politics at Manchester Grammar School and a contributor to Politics UK 8th edn. (Routledge). He tweets @Kelly1958R.