Believe me! Some Prisoners will get the vote in Great Britain!

It's only a matter of time before Parliament roles-over for the European Court of Human Rights!

I feel pretty cheesed-off to believe that our leaded friend Jack Straw has wasted Parliament's time by bring this motion!

All my respect for Jack Straw has gone in the last month because the following:
1. The releasing the mass murder and most probably the most dangerous Prisoner (Pan-am Bomber)in Great Britain on his political watch.
2. Not taking action against prisoner votes while he was in office(Wake up Mr Davis).
3. His father was in Prison and he should know the otherside of being Prisoner.
4. The Iraq Inquiry and playing- down that he didn't know the war was illegal! Most other Lawyers knew the war was illegal. I forgot he not an International Lawyer! Tosh I tell you!

How dare he bring this motion??? And I can't believe how stupid Mr Davis was for going along with it!!!

Thank god for Prime Minister David Cameron!!! Look how GREAT David Cameron looks for all their nonsense!

@Lloyd Jenkins:

1) "It's clear that we restrict some rights for the purposes of preventing crime:"

No we don't: we make the loss of liberty, the restriction of freedom of assembly and loss of voting privileges available to the courts - only post-conviction - as mete and proportionate punishment for those convicted of certain crimes. There is a whole host of crimes for which those convicted lose neither liberty nor voting privileges.

1) "The obvious problem is that our voting ban doesn't prevent crime:"

That's because it's not designed or intended to; so I feel your point is specious.

2) "... whether or not you keep your vote is too dependent on when the next election is called for losing it to be an effective deterrent."

Again, when the next election is, or indeed who wins it, is utterly irrelevant: successive gov'ts of all hues have maintained the loss of voting privileges on being convicted and jailed for certain serious crimes. I'm not arguing for a blanket ban on voting for everyone convicted of 'any' crime (esp petty crime, or those of a more social ill, like defaulting on debts, as this last one would disenfranchise two thirds of the nation.) Nor do I favour any recommended time served - e.g. only those serving over fours years - as a trigger for loss of voting privileges. As has been stated by all sides: we, in the UK, have general suffrage, not universal suffrage.

Add to that the fact that The European Court of Human Rights has, over the years since its inception, deviated wildly from its initial brief, and founding ethos (i.e. it was put in place to counter the atrocities of WWII, not to attempt to impose legislation on the legislatures of sovereign nations) and you end up with a body which has, as was stated in the House today, awarded itself an unremitting license to 'mission creep'.

Let me state here that I am not in favour of withdrawing from the ECHR (the court or the convention); more so, I'd like to see the UK gov't impose its sovereignty in telling them both where the line is drawn.

@Lloyd Jenkins:

"...Elections cannot be free when Parliament restricts who can vote."

Yes they can - when both the law of the land (in a sovereign nation) enjoys the level support of the far greater numbers of those who are not convicted of any crime - these being the same people who voted in said parliament and from whom all its power is derived.

"Our courts are also deeply deferential to the legislative and executive branches. If we had a US-style supreme court, I'd be happier with leaving them to decide."

You've not been keeping an eye on recent events in our own Supreme Court, who think nothing of tossing back legal hot potatoes to parliament whenever they get it wrong or act ultra vires (and rightly so).

And that'd be the same US Supreme Court which is entirely politically selected by the sitting president of the day - notwithstanding that the US Supreme Court can be overridden (as can ours) by parliament - and (in complete contrast to the ECHR) sit and works on behalf of a sovereign nation?

I'm not a million miles from agreeing with you Lloyd, but I think it is a bit different to say 51% can remove the vote from others for no reason, to saying they can if they have been convicted of a serious crime. And I would not be against the ban ending, personally.

But some of the criticisms of the ECtHR did seem somewhat well founded to me, beyond the usual 'foreigners meddling with the UK' position.

I do have another question: if ministers use s. 10 of the Human Rights Act to amend the legislation by Order, can Parliament veto that?

The initial premises for this argument are deeply flawed and involve a rather contorted legalistic logic. Let us be clear, Parliament has supreme sovereignty in the UK, and any treaty obligations whether under the ECHR or any other agreement remain subject to the right of a later Parliament to rescind them. MPs therefore have every right to change the law, subject to following the procedures and processes of Parliament - that is, they clearly *make* the law in the UK.

Within this context, clearly we are bound by the EHCR as long as Parliament does not vote to revoke any enabling legislation. However, Parliament, that is MPs, can change the law, and this may put the UK squarely in conflict with, in this case, the EHCR and may involve either some compromise, complying with the ruling, or alternatively eventual withdrawal or rescinding of the enabling legislation (i.e. the Human Rights Act 1998 c.42). Now, this may be difficult, even unlikely and painful for the UK to do, depending on the further implications that this may raise, but these are *political* not necessarily legal issues.

The current disenchantment with politics in the UK is deeply concerning, and without a doubt the MPs in Parliament have largely bought this on themselves. Nonetheless, it is crucial that politics does not become a handmaiden to the law, and remains flexible and able to respond to public concerns. Otherwise, the very legitimacy of law itself will become problematised, and further, law will disconnect from politics and the crucial link between law and democracy will be broken. A very unsettling prospect indeed.

And, of course, we do have somewhere in the region of 8000 people in prison at any one time who are on remand but untried. They are already entitled to vote.
The way that most news organisations, let alone politicians, fail to acknowledge this does make me wonder how much notice they are paying to the principle of innocent until proven guilty.

Interesting the arguments deployed by (mostly) Tory MPs:

1) Few prisoners want the vote.

Denying a group the right to vote on the grounds some members do not wish to exercise that vote sets a precedent for disenfranchising many law-abiding segments of society!

2) Most prisoners will not exercise the right.

So politicians shouldn't be concerned that the votes of the minority of prisoners will skew any results!

3) voting is irrelevant to most prisoners who have other priorities

Or so Jonathan Aitken on BBC Radio 4 claimed prisoners have told him.

Which doesn't say much for the relevance of politicians and the political process to the lives of many.

4) Prisoners forfeit their rights when convicted.

Yet we continue to satisfy their right to food, water and shelter, to contact with family and friends (at present). The only right denied for the duration of their imprisonment is freedom.

The only convicted prisoners who should be denied the right to vote are those who have denied that right, inter alia, to their victims. I.e. those convicted of murder or manslaughter.

Prisoners Votes ?
Ofcourse... as yet another ex-politico heads for the slammer (J. Divine) !

Perhaps it may not be an issue really, given our wonderfully generous, largely unwritten and therefore flexible UK constitution. It seems reasonable to assume that once imprisoned one may not be free to vote in elections. This is surely not a blanket ban. It's just one of those important little places in the context of UK Law and order referred to by our Justice secretary somewhere I believe as,
"hell's a poppin".

One wonders if by this he means a kind of constitutional equivalent of limbo - that fabled place we used to draw in chalk on pavements as children - between heaven and hell? But where are the UK commons? I don't really know anymore but never mind. Let common sense prevail, I say.

It's clear that we restrict some rights for the purposes of preventing crime: prisoners have their rights to speech, family life and liberty restricted. The obvious problem is that our voting ban doesn't prevent crime: whether or not you keep your vote is too dependent on when the next election is called for losing it to be an effective deterrent.

Bren: what are the arguments in favour of such an irrational system? Perhaps you could enlighten us.

I'm not legally trained and yet I understood the ruling to mean exactly this. Either the government (whose solution is cack-handed) and these pontificating MPs aren't intelligent enough to be in a position of power, or are willing to lie to remove us from ECHR.
Either way, they need to be removed quickly.

But Frodl is still ECHR case law, so I fail to see what difference it makes.

I actually pretty much agree that it is more desirable to allow prisoners to vote. But I feel that's a value judgment and not a fundamental human right.

A lot of what I thought was the higher quality debate was not that which was opposing prisoners voting, but (to crudely summarise it) the objection that the ECHR lacks legitimacy to lay down a political ruling like this. And that even if it were a proper matter for a court at all, since our own courts are able to issue declarations of incompatibility, why do we need the ECHR to supervise them at all? Our judges are appointed through an accountable process and at the Supreme Court level, must be extremely experienced. While the ECHR judges might also be somewhat accountable and experienced, it was alleged they are less so and that the whole process is shady. So why is the ECHR interpretation of the obligations under the convention superior? Again this is not necessarily my view but I do think it's an important point needing further debate if the ECHR is to be seen as legitimate.

My personal preferred policy would be that a prisoner can vote if they are due for release within the 5 years following the election. But if Frodl is good law, the only correct approach is the court's own opinion on what is a better system.