Wangaratta Councillor Ashlee Fitzpatrick has called on Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack to explain his comment that young voters are a "problem".
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Reports surfaced this week about various comments the Nationals' leader made at a gathering of party members in Cowra, NSW on Tuesday night.
He was quoted as saying; "One of the biggest problems we've got in this election is the fact that we've got a lot of young people voting for the first time...who have probably never known how good they've got it".
Cr Fitzpatrick, who was elected to council at just 19 in 2017, said she was "mind-blown" to read about the meeting on social media.
"I couldn't believe this was what I was reading and that it had come from our Deputy Prime Minister," she said.
"He is in a powerful role, with the ability to empower people and that's not what he's done through these comments.
In other news:
"I think he should explain himself and apologise; what are you trying to say, what are you trying to achieve with that comment?"
Cr Fitzpatrick said the fact more 18 to 24-year-olds were registered to vote on May 18 than ever before (88.8 per cent) was heartening and called on Indi candidates to commit to the establishment of a Youth Minister.
"There needs to be a federal strategy developed with our young people so they have better representation," she said.
"I am constantly contacted by young people who want to have conversations - they need someone they can relate to and trust.
"Young voices matter, our vote does count, and we're not the problem."
Mr McCormack told The Daily Advertiser he "worried that in this election we are going to have a lot of young people who are voting either for the first time or indeed for the second, third or fourth time, who have not experienced a recession".
"That's a great thing, because we don't want to go into recession, but at this election we do face the prospect - and it's a prospect of Bill Shorten and higher taxes, less jobs and less prosperity in the future, or the government we've got now, which is promising jobs and a better future," he said.
"So in the context of young people not having to pay high interest - I know when Catherine and I bought our first home it was 18 per cent which then went up even higher than that - I don't want young people to experience that when they are trying to get into the own home."
