AROUND 60 voters shunned the televised leaders’ debate on Thursday night to watch Newport West's parliamentary candidates battle it out at the city’s final hustings meeting before polling day.

At the Bethel Community Church meeting, hosted by Churches Together in Newport, incumbent Labour MP Paul Flynn took on Conservative candidate Matthew Williams, the Green Party’s Pippa Bartolotti, Veronica German for the Liberal Democrat’s, and Plaid Cymru’s Jeff Rees to discuss lowering the voting age to 16, asylum seekers and internet gambling.

Prior to the debate, all five candidates signed an ethical campaigning contract promising not to personally attack their opponents in the final days of the election campaign, before agreeing they would all like to see the voting age lowered to 16.

But Green Party candidate Pippa Bartolotti said her party would also support young people by abolishing university tuition fees, while focusing on job creation in the green collar industries to recover the national economy.

John Rees, for Plaid Cymru, said getting his party into Westminster would mean the best deal for Wales.

He also discussed ideas such as getting young people into employment through introducing a year’s ‘national service’ in the voluntary sector, and tackling internet gambling through looking at the lessons learned from other countries where gambling is a state monopoly.

Conservative candidate Matthew Williams said his party wanted to increase the number of apprenticeships for young people, and that he would fight for a better Newport.

On the issue of asylum, Lib Dem candidate Veronica Green said asylum seekers should be given temporary status to allow them to contribute towards the UK economy, but added that her party would tackle immigration by strengthening border exit controls.

Labour candidate Paul Flynn asked voters to look at his record of the last 23 years, and promised to keep fighting to bring jobs to Newport through shared service centres.

* British National Party candidate Timothy Windsor and UKIP candidate Hugh Moelwyn Hughes were not represented at the meeting.