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kempie Fri 01/08/08 17:07
The age of majority in the UK, as per the Family Law Reform Act 1969, is 18.
For me, I left school and went in to full time employment at 14 but wasn't entitled to vote until I was 21.
Today, however, you cannot vote until you are 18 but you can leave home at 16, and get married (with parental consent) at 18.
terambulan Fri 01/08/08 18:42
Today its 15
kempie Fri 01/08/08 19:12
Parental consent is required for the marriage of minors (specifically 16 and 17 years old) in the UK except for Scotland, where no such consent is required.
factor30 Sat 02/08/08 08:19
Gosh Ethel- you must be older than I thought if voting age was 21 in your day.
I wonder if anyone on AB remembers when women didn't have the vote at all.
Ethel Sat 02/08/08 15:22
The age of voting was only lowered from 21 to 18 in 1969.
Lots of people on this site will not have able to vote until they were 21
kempie Sat 02/08/08 17:09
13th March 1970 was the first occasion 18-year-olds were allowed to vote in the UK after the age of majority was reduced from 21 on 1st January of that year.
It was the Representation of the People Act 1928 which provided universal suffrage - women and men aged 21 and over could vote.
Thus any ABer born in the years 1907-1948 could not have voted until reaching age 21.
However, an ABer would need to be in excess of 90 years of age to remember a time before property owning women aged 30-years and over were first given entitlement to vote under the Representation of the People Act 1918.