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Pictured: Five of the six visiting MPs, from left, Tracey Martin, Peter Dunne, Janet Logie, David Seymour and Kelvin Davis with school teacher Catherine Wynne (fourth from the left).
By Ben Donaldson
The Mahurangi College hall took on the appearance of the Beehive on August 3, when six visiting MPs from different parties took questions and watched a heated student debate.
The visitors were United Future leader Peter Dunne, Labour MP Kelvin Davis, ACT leader David Seymour, National MP Mark Mitchell, Green MP Janet Logie and New Zealand First MP Tracey Martin.
The event was organised by student Julia Caulfield, who attended the Aotearoa Youth Declaration last year and helped set up a Youth Parliament at the school.
“I originally had planned to have just a member the major political parties, but then extended the invitation to include a representative from each sitting political party,” she says.
“I was shocked when all the responses came back accepting the invitation as I know MPs are extremely busy. I was surprised that so many were willing to attend and support this initiative.”
The event began with a welcome in the marae, followed by a question and answer session in the hall and a debate on whether New Zealand should be a republic or not.
The debate resulted in the ‘for a republic’ side winning 65 votes to 62.
“The debate was really interesting because most of the students at the beginning were against the republic, which was different from the outcome.
“All the students who spoke in the debate did an incredible job and proved their points well,” Julia says.
Mr Seymour said he thought it was some of the better debating he had seen from young people.
Mahurangi College principal David Macleod said he thought the event was an interesting way for the students to learn about politics.
“We have in recent years had visits from several high ranking MPs, including Helen Clark, John Key and Winston Peters, who all related well to our students, but on this occasion the MPs actually joined in a debate and spoke personally about what motivated them as politicians, and about political processes,” he said.
Mrs Martin said she was heartened to see an interest in politics from the students and was grateful that the invited politicians attended.
“The Electoral Commission runs a mock General Election inside schools during an election year and each of the MPs indicated that they would be keen to return and participate in that programme should the school agree to take part.
“I will now work with the school and student body to see if we can make this happen.”
The school has twice visited Wellington and parliament, and the trip looks set to become an annual event.
Julia says she is looking for a career in a Parliamentary role and has joined a party and its youth side to get involved.
