Peter Rhodes on voting, harmony and how a smartphone saved a funeral
Forget all the meaningless blather about fairness and maturity. The Government's only reason for lowering the voting age from 18 to 16 is the hope that it will get them more votes.
This is based on the old belief, or the delusion, that kids are naturally left-of-centre. But whatever their politics, how many under-18s will turn out? As any 16-year-old will tell you, voting is something old people do.
Meanwhile, King Charles has been saving the planet with a Harmony Summit at Highgrove to celebrate the wisdom of indigenous people. The BBC report positively ladled the adjectives on HM, describing him as “a humane, ruminative, humorous and quietly radical figure". He is certainly all those things, and is constant in his long-held belief in the power of chatting with plants. However, I was surprised to see, as tinder-dry Gloucestershire baked in the drought, that His Majesty started the event with a fire ceremony. Most odd.
