Jersey Youth Assembly
The Jersey Youth Assembly is held once a year and brings together year 12 and 13 students from the Island’s post-16 schools and colleges to spend an afternoon in the States Chamber.
Preparing for the Youth Assembly
The students ask questions of Ministers and debate propositions on topics that they have chosen. Students spend several weeks preparing for the Assembly with their tutors and with staff of the States Greffe and research a topic to present in their proposition.
What happens during the Assembly?
The afternoon is designed to mirror as closely as possible a normal States meeting with roll call and prayers at the start before the young participants ask questions of Ministers who are invited to attend. After this period of questions with notice - which follows the format of question time in the States - there is a period of 15 minutes when the students ask questions without notice to the Chief Minister.
After question time the students debate the topics they have chosen and vote at the end of the debate using the electronic voting system. A wide range of propositions have been debated in the Youth Assembly since it started in 1998.
What do students get out of it?
The aim of the Jersey Youth Assembly is to promote a clear understanding of how the Island’s government works through ‘hands-on’ participation in Jersey’s unique brand of parliamentary democracy.
Students sit in the seats normally occupied by the 51 elected members and are given a unique forum to express their views and contribute to the formal political debate in the Island. As well as developing valuable skills, the Youth Assembly aims to encourage young people to play a more active role in the democratic process in future and to prove that they do have a part to play.
Several of the young people who have taken part in the Youth Assembly have gone on to participate in the Commonwealth Youth Parliament and the Parlement des Jeunes and one, Deputy Jeremy Maçon, was subsequently elected as a States member.
Download Youth Assembly Order Paper 2011 (size 89kb)
Download Youth Assembly Minutes 2011 (size 41kb)
Download Youth Assembly 2012 Minutes (size 22kb)
Download Youth Assembly 2012 Hansard (size 62kb)