Habs compete in the International Competition for Young Debaters

On the 20 March, four Habs teams competed virtually in the International Competition for Young Debaters (ICYD) hosted by the Cambridge Union. This competition was only open to those in Year 10 and below, and was one of many qualifiers held throughout the country for the finals of the competition which will be held in the summer. This meant the top 14 teams from the 60 teams participating would qualify.

On the day, a variety of topical subjects were debated. These ranged from motions discussing the responsibility of football clubs for their fans actions to the old question of whether juries are necessary in Western democracies. This led to many interesting arguments being heard from principles of democracy to promoting diversity and equality in representation within our legal system.

After four hotly contested debates and an extremely long day the results were in. The teams William (9S2) and Kalum (9C1), as well as Jack (10H2) and Yonal (10M2) unfortunately missed out on the qualification spots by just one point which was extremely impressive especially given it was Kalum’s and Yonal’s first ever debating competition. Toby (10R2) and Samadi (10J1) were also agonisingly close to qualification scoring the necessary number of points to qualify but unfortunately not having high enough speaker points to get through on tiebreaks.

The team consisting of Alex (10M1) and Fola (10M2) managed to qualify for the finals of ICYD having scored the second highest number of speaker points as a team out of all the teams participating on the day and are looking forwards to the finals.

At the end of the day, all teams involved can be proud of their results, with this competition once again showcasing the strength of debating at Habs, especially in the younger years!