MPs are calling for a select committee on young people’s affairs to be set up in Parliament to address the concerns of the iGeneration.

Inspired by The Times’s survey of Britain’s 18 to 30-year-olds, a Commons motion published last night calls for an official forum for the young to be heard at Westminster.

The motion proposed by Andy Burnham, the 34-year-old MP for Leigh, in Manchester, says that it “notes with concern the growing disconnection between young people and the political process, locally and nationally”.

It “believes this trend is due in part to the under-representation of the views and voices of the 18 to 30 age group in the political arena and public debate, as highlighted by the iGeneration initiative in The Times and calls on the Parliamentary authorities to find ways in which young people's views can be better represented in Parliamentary proceedings, starting with the establishment of a Young People's Affairs Select Committee”.

Mr Burnham said that the often surprising views of 18 to 30-year-olds discovered by The Times showed that Parliament was missing out on what the iGeneration had to offer.

The German, French and Spanish parliaments had many more young MPs than Westminster, where not one is below 30. Parliament’s youngest MP is Sarah Teather, the Liberal Democrat member for Brent East, who turned 30 in June.

She said: “I think it is a good idea . . . there will also be a lot of media interest in the reports that come out — but I hope that it would hear evidence from real young people and not just experts. Members of the committee would have to get out of the Commons to meet people, if that is not too revolutionary.”

Mr Burnham was struck by the strong opinions of young people in The Times research, for example on the need for greater discipline in schools.He said: “What The Times has shown this week is that young people have in some ways surprising views on a whole range of issues. But they are surprising because we know so little about them.

“There is so little opportunity to contribute to the national debate because they are under-represented in the voices which control that debate.”

He wants the committee to be chaired by someone aged under 35. The average age of MPs chairing committees is 60.3. The average age of MPs immediately after the 2001 election was 50.3.

Mr Burnham is one of Labour’s rising stars and is parliamentary private secretary to David Blunkett, the Home Secretary.

He said that Westminster actively discriminated against younger MPs.

“In debates, the Speaker calls Privy Counsellors first and then MPs in the order of the Parliament when they were elected. Younger members are often contributing at the end of a debate and having to cut their speech down — so you are not taken seriously until you have been here for years.

“It seems that our whole system mitigates against younger people.

“ We need a youth affairs select committee to embed this (listening to young people)into the system and build it into mainstream debate.”

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