Filling the gaps: Jam & Justice at Peterloo 2019

On Tuesday 18 June, ARC member Paul Maher joined the panel for a debate on The Gaps in Representation. Part of the Peterloo Now series, organised by Manchester Histories and the University of Manchester, the event was hosted by Manchester Central Library and promoted as part of Guardian Live.

As a debate about inclusion in parliamentary processes identified patterns of underrepresentation in relation to gender, ethnicity, class, and (at cabinet level) geography, Paul recalled his own exclusion from the British Youth Council thirty years ago, when a cut in funding was used to justify the dismissal of northern representatives. His call for lowering the voting age generated a rare ripple of applause from the 120-strong audience.

Follow the debate as it happened, by reviewing #Peterloo2019 on Twitter.

The panellists (left to right) were: disability rights campaigner Mark Todd; Francesca Gains, Professor of Public Policy and co-director of Policy@Manchester; Guardian journalist Gary Younge; author and speaker Sufiya Ahmed; Jam & Justice ARC member and Business Development Manager at The Children's Society, Paul Maher; Fran Jones, deputy director of the Centre for Local Economic Strategies; and local author and the evening's chair Jonathan Schofield.

Read more about the research Paul helped Jam and Justice set up with colleagues and young researchers at The Children's Society: Young People Missing from Decisions.

You may have missed the debate, but you have until August 2019 to check out another Peterloo 2019 contribution from our Realising Just Cities siblings, Whose Knowledge Matters.

--We are exceptionally grateful to Paul for stepping in when his colleague (and co-researcher on the Young People Missing from Decisions project) Jo Hunt was unable to make it.