The future of Youth in Politics: Oscar Seal Interview, Chairman of the BYC and representative for Public Protection and Enforcement by Lucy Tyrrell Darrick Wood School

“We should treat everything like the space race,”

Oscar Seal is a 16-year-old student in Bromley who serves as Chairman of the Bromley Youth Council (BYC) and as a representative for Public Protection and Enforcement PDS. He joined the council in March of 2020 and became a PP&EPDS representative in May of the same year. Since, he has accelerated rapidly up the ladder of the council, becoming deputy chair in May of 2021 and Chairman in August—just a year and a half after joining. He met with me to talk about the future of young people in politics as well as his roles and the impact that young people are already having on Politics and the world.

The point of a ‘Youth Council’ “is to promote young peoples’ opinions and promote them to the main council”— the council are not just subordinates to the Bromley Council, they are the ears and mouthpiece of young people in our area. The BYC act as what young people want to see on a bigger scale, in every part of life: representation.

As a collective, the BYC do “What young people want to see change in that year, [and] try to enact that as best we can working with the council and independent companies try to reach out as far as we can essentially, to help bring about change,” often through a campaign.

A campaign, Oscar says, is “largely based around awareness, because we don’t have the ability to change laws on our own.”  Which is where the work of the BYC of course overlaps with that of the Bromley Council. This means “working with the council so that they can change laws and make resources available, [whilst] we try to work with schools a lot to benefit their students.” The campaigns are focused upon what the voting from that year revealed. Everyone aged 11-18 votes upon what they believe are the two key issues facing people under 18.  The council go through “all the responses” to find the key issues—these are what form the BYC’s manifesto, and so directs the focus of the BYC for the year. This year it is mental health and the environment. But last year, instead of the environment it was domestic abuse.”

“It is largely about creating awareness, not just for young people but also for adults, who potentially don’t see what kind of an impact that it’s having on young people, and we then also speak to members of the actual Bromley council and we try and secure aid from them in helping our ideas come to life.” Young people bring something different and new to politics. “Because, as the youth council, we’re able to [present] a very different dynamic to other political organisations.

“They [the Bromley council] of course have to focus on everything within Bromley, we’re just helping them see it from a view that is under-represented, and we’re able to shed light on things that they possibly would not consider due to certain demographics within the council.”

“They do listen to us. And they’re listening to us a lot more than they used to, I think that’s partly due to pressure from massive news stories in the summer, when there was massive uproar after the murder of George Floyd. A lot of that in this country was led by young people, because what we’re seeing in this country is that young people are wanting changes; and so I think the council have felt slightly pressured to listen more to us, but even before then they were listening to us.”

He recognises that some see youth organisations as representative positions. “The youth council is working very hard to try and change that perception.” Saying “We’ve had more votes this year than last year [for the manifesto].” In essence, a greater amount of votes are being cast for the subjects of the manifesto—demonstrating young people’s increased interest in making change. “More people are aware that they can have a vote on what they want to see changed.”

There is a sense of duty with this role, with Oscar saying “we have to make sure that to the best of our ability we are carrying out what young people want, because otherwise they’ll see no point in voting and if we lose traction then we can’t help.”

Having always had a lot of interest in politics, Oscar came across UK youth parliament. “I didn’t really understand it much, so I left it for a little bit, but then the voting came round for the BYC, of course that is done in our school, so I saw that and thought I’d ask my form tutor,”. As it happens, Oscar’s form tutor knew the student representative for the UK Youth parliament, and so Oscar “sat down had a meeting with him…in the end I got elected. I did also message the BYC social media page on Instagram and I got a really good response detailing everything that we do.”

“It was either did I want to have an impact, or did I want to have some kind of power? But I think it was definitely for me down to impact. Because there were lots of things I was unhappy with, and so I thought if I could change it, that would be good, and I think progress has been made to some extent.”

Attempting to change some adults preconceived perceptions of young people was an aim of Oscar’s, and as he has progressed in his roles the treatment of adults to young people has evolved. “There are definitely still murmurings of, well, general stereotypes of youths in hoodies. It’s definitely being worked on.”

Whilst it seems that young people are perceived by adults as either loutish or precocious, some think that young people can be a force for change. Does Oscar think that young people have potential as changemakers? “Yes. Completely. Every generation has a potential to make a big change. Because of how they’ve grown up it’s always going to be different to the previous generation.

“But the difference with our generation, is that where we have access to so much technology it’s a lot easier to get everyone organised in the same place. So I think when people are angry, it’s a lot louder.

“Social media is a platform for using your voice, you could live literally anywhere, like the Highlands of Scotland, but what you’re saying has quite a high potential to end up on the desk of some minister in Westminster. So yes. Our generation is in a better position than those that had to do things by word of mouth.”

“This generation have got very different set of focuses to previous generations. A lot of the previous generations, whilst they had different ideas, they were around the same focuses. Our generation have grown up in a time where we need to be focusing on different things like climate change, like mental health, which is a massive one.

“Because now people feel freer to talk about mental health or sexuality, or anything like that, this generation seems to have possibly… more freedom of thought.”

But was the moral, indignant anger (the kind often displayed on social media) that some of our generation harbour born out of necessity, or the freedom of thought and ability to change? Our increased sense of communal empathy came from somewhere. Because we are not members of previous generations, is that why we desire change? “I’m not sure. I think very often the want for change comes from personal circumstances, but then where people are able to share much easier made it a collective circumstance, almost. I think people now are more likely to care about each other’s causes.”

Particularly within the community, is politics a difficult way for young people to take responsibility for the changes they want to see in the community, to represent a larger change in the world we live in? “No. Because politics is literally everywhere in your everyday life. You won’t realise it but even people putting a post on a story on Instagram is a form of activism. And activism is normally very political, and so I think in peoples’ minds it means that politics is this really hard subject to approach and know how to deal with, but in reality, everyone knows a lot more than they think they do to do with it. It is just life, really.”

So how much if politics is instinctual? To a degree, it is based on cultivated social attitudes, hence the repeated unresolved debates about housing and taxes. How much of it is about seeing something wrong, and changing it? “The point we’ve gotten to in Britain, a lot of it is the same old tired debates that we will go on having for a long long time, because we’ve had so many polarising figures with varying opinions. So I think people have got their instincts, but it’s  at the moment it’s being swayed more towards those same old debates. Our generation is a lot less like that.”

Oscar believes in slow, measured change. “Without it, you just close yourself up to repeated circumstance where you have more fighting. Violence breeds violence, but with slow systematic change, using the current system to create a new one…that is more beneficial, that can last a lot longer.

“As newer younger ministers slowly make their way into government…it’s going to be a crossing over point of generational beliefs.”

As we develop into the ministers of a dawning new age in politics, the role of the young must move forward with that change. Oscar says that “there needs to be make recognition of young people, their ideas. We saw with Greta Thunberg that she brought this massive international cause and she went all the way to the UN, but no productive change has come from it. Everyone felt pressured into doing something, but nothing has happened yet. Yes, it takes a long time to make change, but something should have been done by now. And it hasn’t. It’s just the setting of more deadlines.

“I think if young people were listening to a wider range of subjects, not just things that are going to affect our generation—but are currently affecting every generation-- that would benefit everyone. Because it offers another perspective, and with politics you need as many perspectives as you can get in order to make the right decision.

“By saying ‘oh we’ll be carbon neutral by,’…by creating these deadlines you’re giving yourself time to delay— it should be ‘this is where we need to get to, we’re starting now, and we’re going to get to there as soon as we can. We should just treat everything like the space race.”

Oscar emphasises the importance of voting when you can, even if for some of us it’s the little youth council leaflet delivered in morning registration. “Otherwise you don’t have a voice. Young people have such a small voice despite being the ones that these changes are going to impact. I understand that you can’t give everyone the vote, but there definitely needs to be a voice, and at the moment the youth councils are the largest voice that young people have in Britain.”

Although, Oscar “really like[s] petitions! Oh, anyone can start a petition. Because you can make it, stick it on your Instagram story, and if you’ve got a good enough point that enough people can get behind, minsters will see it. And they’ll have to debate it. That’s a really good system. It brings ideas to the attention of those who are meant to listen to constituents.”

But does Oscar feeling like change is coming? “Massive, massive change is coming within fifteen, twenty years. It’ll be a level of change that we will probably have seen before, but not done like this. It will be a complete social political upheaval. What is currently happening, meaning worldwide, we don’t necessarily have loads and loads of governments who need removing, we have loads and loads of scenarios that need changing. It’s not going to be a revolution; it’s just going to be a new way of thinking.”

By Lucy Tyrrell

Please read my fellow young reporter’s companion piece, Youth, disillusionment and politics; an interview by Luca Irvine, for a different perspective! Read it on the link below: Youth, disillusionment and politics; an interview. Luca Irvine, Darrick Wood School. | This Is Local London