As a young person, I’m excited to vote for the first time this election, but if the major parties want to engage young voters, they need to spend less time on TikTok trends and more time tackling the crises facing our generation.

Natasha Abhayawickrama, 20, lives in Marrickville - in the heart of Anthony Albanese’s seat of Grayndler.Credit: Louise Kennerley

I’m a student, a renter and a constituent of the prime minister. I don’t want to hear him use Gen Z slang in parliament and I don’t want to hear him say that he “cares” about young people. What I want to see is real action on the cost-of-living crisis, on the climate crisis and the genocide in Palestine, and I want to see the major parties put young people over the profits of billion-dollar corporations. And it’s not just me – hundreds of thousands of young voters are turning away from the major parties in the polls.

This election, we’ve seen the two major parties put on a performance to engage with young voters. Peter Dutton has rolled out his son in the media to seem more relatable, while the prime minister has promised to wipe 20 per cent of student HECS debt. These........

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