EDINBURGH, January 19 (Sputnik), Mark Hirst — An agreement has been reached between the Scottish authorities and the UK Government on giving 16 and 17-year-olds the vote in Scottish parliamentary elections, Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said Monday.
"It has long been this Government's policy to reduce the voting age to 16," Sturgeon said in a statement.
"The Scottish Government's decision to extend the vote to 16 and 17-year-olds in the referendum legislation is widely seen as an outstanding success and contributed to the unprecedented level of democratic engagement we witnessed," she added.
For the first time ever 16-year-olds were allowed to vote in the Scottish independence referendum, held on September 18, 2014.
More than 55 percent of all Scottish voters rejected independence from the UK in last September's poll, but subsequent analysis of the result by Lord Michael Ashcroft revealed strong support, 71 percent, for independence among the teenagers.
