While many high school students are winding down this winter break, three Blue Mountains teenagers are giving young people a voice inside NSW Parliament House.
Natasha Tioukavkin (Year 12), Ben Medveczky and Pailey Wang (both Year 11) joined 167 other teenagers in the annual YMCA NSW Youth Parliament sitting week on Monday, representing the Blue Mountains region.
The Youth Parliament is apolitical, but the structure resembles the way state politics operates.
Natasha, who attends St Marys Senior High School, will act as a member of the government in the legislative assembly and sit on the citizenship and communities committee.
Ben, a Penrith High School student, will be part of the opposition line-up in the lower house and be part of a committee looking at ways to phase out coal mining, while fellow Penrith High student Pailey will be an independent senator and get to vote in the legislative council.
“I’m a bit of a politics nerd and like to watch Question Time which is often just a bit of theatre, but having participated in the Youth Parliament last year, I can say it is much more civilised,” Pailey said. “If you stumble over your words, they [the MPS on the other side of the chamber] won’t yell at you.”
Together with her fellow participants, Natasha has been crafting a bill for the sitting week that aims to increase youth involvement in policy making.
“As the future generation, it is of extreme importance for the key issues facing youth today to be heard and acted upon,” she said.
“Our proposal aims to achieve this by establishing youth advisory councils across NSW and holding forums to be conducted in schools.
“This bill and many others will be debated and voted upon by all the Youth MPs and by Friday all the bills voted for will be presented to the NSW government and opposition for consideration.
“Over half a dozen pieces of Youth Parliament legislation in the last 14 years have since been passed into NSW law.”
Natasha said she approached Blue Mountains MP Trish Doyle for advice in the lead-up to the sitting week.
“She gave me some really good networking tips — things like how to approach organisations that could be particularly relevant to us, like Mountains Youth Services Team.”
Ben said a lot of state MPs will be attending the Youth Parliament sitting week to observe and assist.
“It will be great to meet them all and also meet the Governor of NSW David Hurley, who will be hosting a welcoming reception for us at Government House.”
For more information, visit www.ymcansw.org.au/centres/youth-government/ymca-nsw-youth-parliament.
