Prisoner voting rights are undemocratic

charles hercock

So Mr Gibbs,what would it take for the Supreme court to be Supreme

Are we not totally fed up of kowtowing to the Franco-German view of the world

We can stick with the economic block and run our own courts as we have effectively since Henry Plantagenet and the delightful Eleanor

Edward McLaughlin

Democracy does not, I'm afraid to say, come into it or anywhere near it.

Who of the demos can do anything which might have the slightest effect on this?

Robert Eve

I have no more faith in our new Supreme Court than I have in the ECHR.

Ex-Tory voter

"The result is a major change to national policy that did not originate here. This is not democratic." The whole EU shebang is not democratic. I want out, which is why I abandoned the Tory party under Cameron.

Jez

Please, no intelectual find it upon them to unleash the their wrath upon this question.... but what would happen if, for some crazy, insane reason, the Prime Minister would say;

"this is not in sync with public opinion, this is not the wishes of any elected entity within these shores and i am not going to sign this leglislation"

He would have almost across the board support domestically.

What would happen then?

We pay in more than we get out, they need us in- so what would happen.

Why is the Prime Minister so cuckolded, so humiliated (almost on a daily basis now) by the EU, crumbling into submission at every turn.

Number one, it's embarrasing.

Number two, why don't they just come clean and tell us it's over as an independant country.

We've been annexed.

Andy Leeds

Prisoners have been unable to vote since 1870. They were unable to vote in 1950 when the ECHR was signed. It was in accordance with the treaty in 1950, so was sentence of death for murder, so it cannot possibly contrary to the convention in 2010. It is the political judges who have interpreted the convention incorrectly.

yank

Nice to read something sensible on these pages. I'd popped back in here, and the world seemed to have gone mad.

David Lindsay

If we returned to the situation whereby we could safely assume that almost everyone convicted deserved to be, and where there was far less crime anyway due to proper policing, then no one would be suggesting this. We could also have proper sentencing, and a proper regime for the far fewer people who were in prison.

That is the problem, in this instance, with the Lib Dems, the party that wants to give Ian Huntley the vote. They are quite good on civil liberties, but fail to see that that stand in incomprehensible and meaningless unless it is part of a package otherwise comprised of real policing, real sentences and real prison discipline. That last, at least, excludes the right to vote.

We also urgently need to legislate for the disapplication in the United Kingdom of any ruling of the European Court of Human Rights, or of the European Court of Justice, or of the "Supreme Court" if it strikes down or otherwise compromises the Statute Law, or under the Human Rights Act under the same circumstance, unless ratified by a resolution of the House of Commons. Ed Miliband, over to you.

Andrew Lim

In NZ, our conservative National Government has initiated legislation to ban all prisoners from voting. The previous PC Labour government allowed prisoners serving less than three years to vote. People have to realise that prison isn't some free fancy hotel with three square meals a day, it's a place of punishment and rehabilitation. The message should be if you do the crime, you do the time which means you lose some priveleges. Voting is not a right, it is a privelege.

Ivy Eileen

"...pursued his claim relentlessly for years". Who funded this action ?

I heard this gentleman on the 9.00 a.m. news today. From the clip broadcast, he looks (and thinks) down a very narrow telescope. He also sounded as hard as nails.

Surely, a prisoner in a gaol has broken his contract with Society ... ergo, no rights whilst in prison. This is the problem with something like the ECHR. It has no understanding or interest with the mores of this country and thinks totally in socially abstract concepts.

Tess

I just stumbled across this article and would like to point out that the argument is completely illogical.

It claims that giving prisoners the right to vote is 'undemocratic' without giving any explanation why. If anything, denying individuals the right to vote is undemocratic.

Also, what would be the point in being a part of Europe without being subject to its court decisions? One of the purposes of the EC was to harmonize laws across all member states.

What this article shows is a complete lack of understanding of the way in which the EC works - of course every decision must originate from an individual bringing their case in front of the court. Finally, the correct abbreviation for the Court is ECtHR, as ECHR actually stands for the Convention.

Edward McLaughlin

Jez

"Why is the Prime Minister so cuckolded"

More on this please.

AndyinBrum

Not disagreeing with the point, but isn't it always the one test case that defines whether a law is correct or not?

Trumpeter Lanfried

Let's have some realpolitik.

How many divisions has the ECHR?

denis cooper

The Supreme Court cannot be supreme while this remains true:

http://www.supremecourt.gov.uk/about/the-supreme-court-and-europe.html

"The Supreme Court is the highest court of appeal in the United Kingdom. However, The Court must give effect to directly applicable European Union law, and interpret domestic law so far as possible consistently with European Union law. It must also give effect to the rights contained in the European Convention on Human Rights.

Under the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (article 267), The Court must refer to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in Luxembourg any question of European Union law, where the answer is not clear and is necessary for it to give judgment.

In giving effect to rights contained in the European Convention on Human Rights, The Court must take account of any decision of the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. No national court should “without strong reason dilute or weaken the effect of the Strasbourg case law” (Lord Bingham of Cornhill in R (Ullah) v Special Adjudicator [2004] UKHL 26)."

This is all, be it noted, exactly as Parliament has said it should be; Parliament retains the right to say otherwise, but we keep electing MPs who are too pusillanimous and too indifferent to our national democracy and the sovereignty of their own Parliament, our Parliament, to stand up and do that.

As I understand your proposal would only affect the next paragraph:

"An individual contending that his Convention rights have not been respected by a decision of a United Kingdom court (including The Supreme Court) against which he has no domestic recourse may bring a claim against the United Kingdom before the European Court of Human Rights."

and I cannot agree that the government and Parliament should tell us that we have these rights but then deliberately make it difficult for us to enforce them.

Moreover for as long as Parliament is not prepared to pass a statute to disapply an ECHR judgement, as far as this country is concerned, then it would be pointless for Parliament to "take a view" on a Supreme Court judgement which is conditioned by the same ECHR judgement.

Verity

Almost everyone in Britain loathes the Sovietesque EUSSR, membership in which was never approved by a vote from the British electorate.

My question: I know Cameron isn't the brightest light in the harbour, but does he understand why, after four years as Tory Leader, he couldn't get elected? Does he understand that any candidate who gives a renege-proof pledge to have an in-out referendum will be elected next time?

I find it hard to belive that he could be this stupid, or even this self-confident that he can perform some feat of ledgerdemain that will convince the British to vote for the Tories, or the Coalation, in the next election.

Does he really think, despite the blogs and letters to editors, that the British haven't noticed that he has reneged on every election promise he made re the EUSSR?

It's eerie.

Tarka the Rotter

Suggested new names for the Supreme Court:

The Subservient Court
The Lickspittle Court
The Diet of Worms (historical reference there folks...)
The Starcrossed Chamber

go on have a go...you know you want to

Tarka the Rotter

And will the European Court of Human Rights rule it undemocratic that the British people have not been given a chance to say whether they want to be part of 'ever closer union' or not - after all, we were taken in on a lie back in 1973. Oh...of course not, silly me. What's democratic about being told what to do by a foreign power you didn't vote for?

Ray Griffin

Whilst I want out of the European Union, and cannot support the nonsense of the courts decision or the cowardice of Cameron in giving it heed, please be aware that the ECHR has nothing to with the European Union. In others words we can tell Strasbourg to Eff Off and it has nothing to with Brussels.

TrevorsDen

Dear 'ex tory voter' ...
How thick do you have to be?

This is down to the European Convention on Human Rights which came about in 1950.
It has nothing to do with the EU and as the post suggest all to do with legislation enacted in the 1960's and probably labours recent Human Rights Act 1998.

There is if I remember more than one way to skin a cat, but it is still pathetic that we have to waste time trying to sort all this out.
Meantime why get worked up and play into the hands of the ex-prisoner whose sole intent is to simply get you worked up?

TrevorsDen

Dear Tess (and Jez et al) - ditto as per what I said to ex-tory voter.
If you are going to complain at least get your facts right. The ECHR is nothing to do with the EU.

Dear Mr Lindsay you are charmingly naive.

The police do not prevent crime - they try to catch police after the crime has been 'committed.
'Proper policing' does not prevent someone smashing in his landlady's head with an axe.

The issue with any ANY treaty you sign is that you are bound by it and lose some control. We are in NATO. If someone attacks Belgium (for what ever reason) we we are treaty bound to help them.

BTW - my brother in law is over from Norway. They are not in the EU but have signed up to enact EU legislation. Crazy. So now they face the same EU immigration problems as we do. Mind you with beer at £6 a pint they will at least be tea-total.

Jez

Er, Edward,

I think it's something to do with gimps.

I apologise- got a bit carried away maybe! :-/

They (Cameron and the team) needs to get a backbone and stand up to that bitch, the EU.

Ok, that's dumbed it it down to a new level... the only way is up now guys! xx

Alan Pavelin

It is a fundamental principle of democracy that everyone be allowed to vote, including people we might consider unworthy of the privilege. Once you start excluding particular groups, be it on grounds of income, education, or criminality, you are forfeiting democracy.

Daedalus

What happens if two candidates at an election are on opposite sides of the criminal debate. Ones a lock em up and throw away the key, the other is keep them out and give them community sentences. If the seat is well balanced with a small majority one way or the other it could be quite easy for those in gaol to swing the vote. The wrong direction for me.

Commentator

Clearly not as thick as you, TrevorsDen. The ECHR has in fact been incorporated into EU law, since the Human Rights Act 1998 was passed.

denis cooper

Trevorsden hasn't read the parts of the Lisbon Treaty which relate to the ECHR.

denis cooper

Ray Griffin -

Why then does the Telegraph report:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/8103580/Prisoners-to-get-the-vote-for-the-first-time.html

denis cooper

Ray Griffin -

Why then does the Telegraph report:

""He was told that the Government faced a series of compensation claims from prisoners and potential legal action from the European Union if it did not agree to a change."?

Boudicca

Cameron will no more stick two fingers up to the ECHR and make the British Supreme Court actually supreme in the UK, that he will to the Politburo in Brussels.

He is another professional politician who cares more about what his buddies in the EU think than the British people.

I am so glad I wasn't fooled and didn't vote for him.

denis cooper

TrevorsDen -

Instead of your usual "It has nothing to do with the EU" mindless garbage, try reading this:

http://eur-lex.europa.eu/JOHtml.do?uri=OJ:C:2007:306:SOM:EN:HTML

"Treaty of Lisbon amending the Treaty on European Union and the Treaty establishing the European Community, signed at Lisbon, 13 December 2007"

With a number of relevant provisions, eg:

"8) Article 6 shall be replaced by the following:

‘Article 6

1. The Union recognises the rights, freedoms and principles set out in the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union of 7 December 2000, as adapted at Strasbourg, on 12 December 2007, which shall have the same legal value as the Treaties.

The provisions of the Charter shall not extend in any way the competences of the Union as defined in the Treaties.

The rights, freedoms and principles in the Charter shall be interpreted in accordance with the general provisions in Title VII of the Charter governing its interpretation and application and with due regard to the explanations referred to in the Charter, that set out the sources of those provisions.

2. The Union shall accede to the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. Such accession shall not affect the Union's competences as defined in the Treaties.

3. Fundamental rights, as guaranteed by the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and as they result from the constitutional traditions common to the Member States, shall constitute general principles of the Union's law.’"

Jason Sands

Commentator wrote: "The ECHR has in fact been incorporated into EU law, since the Human Rights Act 1998 was passed."

The Human Rights Act is UK law, not EU law, and even if the ECHRE were fully incorporated, that wouldn't make the ECtHR part of the EU.

Dimoto

An act requiring that prisoners not qualifying for parole, shall have their right to vote suspended.

Jason Sands

denis cooper: The text you quote makes the EU subject to the Convention, but does not give the EU control of the court, as it has no jurisdiction to do so.

Barry Bilge

This bit makes no sense:

"Now we have our own Supreme Court, that institution would become the final arbiter in cases like this and they would be taken out of the ambit of the Strasbourg justices."

If things were fine before Wilson and we didn't have a Supreme Court then, we don't need one to address this issue now. Why did the Government introduce that court?

FF

The fact it was a European level court that passed the judgment is a bit of a red herring. The point of principle is whether courts should have a constitutional oversight over legislation that gets passed by Parliament or whether that body should be absolutely sovereign. If the same case came before the Supreme Court now there's a good chance it would come to the same conclusion. Judges have become a lot more activist.

denis cooper

Jason Sands -

I didn't suggest that the EU has taken control of the ECHR; on the contrary it seems that the EU is potentially taking on the role of an enforcer for the ECHR, because:

"3. Fundamental rights, as guaranteed by the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms ... shall constitute general principles of the Union's law."

and therefore presumably compliance could fall within the jurisdiction of the EU's Court of Justice.

denis cooper

FF - in the absence of external influences a UK court would not question a clearly expressed Act defining who shall and who shall not have the right to vote, so the fact that the judgement has come from a European court is certainly not a red herring.

Captn P

Why not?

We let unions fund political parties and candidates.

We should let large corporations fund candidates, imagine what a BP or BA funded candidate could achieve for thier organisations profits.

chevron

The system could get around constituency effects by introducing new MPs that cover prisons within a region?

Presumably if prisoners are allowed a vote, they can also (hypothetically) stand as MPs? Or is this barred by some other legislation?

But yes, prisoners getting the vote is a disgrace, just as it is a disgrace that we cannot decide this for ourselves.

Paul Hawkins

One 'no' argument could be:
People who have been sent to prison are rightly condemned to “civic death”: they are shut away not only to protect society, but also to symbolise society’s disgust at their acts. Although prisoners are no longer executed in many jurisdictions, the idea of “civic death” is that they lose the rights of citizens without dying in a literal sense. Those who offend against the common good of society should have no right to contribute to the governance of society. They can only be readmitted to society, both physically and in terms of their rights, when they have made amends to society by serving their sentence.

Jason Sands

denis cooper "I didn't suggest that the EU has taken control of the ECHR"

You implied it, as you falsely claimed that it was wrong to say that the judgment was not from the EU. If the UK withdrew from the EU and not the Council of Europe the judgment would stand, and the UK choice would be to comply or derogate, as it is now.

Fergus Pickering

But Chevron, didn't I hear someone say that the prisoners would not vote in the constituency where they are, but in the constituency where they were, prior to being housed at Her Majesty's pleasure, where they voted previously? Which means that it doesn't make much difference. They were still the same lying ratbags before; they just hadn't been found out then. I read somewhere that burglars and embezzlers tend to be Tories and violent criminals of a leftist persuasion.

Robert Montyford

It's time people stopped whinging about the liberties taken and imposed on us by the EU,
and did something about it! www.ukatone.com

denis cooper

Jason Sands -

Try reading what I actually wrote, rather than what you think I might have written.

I did not imply that the EU had taken control of the ECHR, nor did I claim that "it was wrong to say that the judgment was not from the EU".

What I said to TrevorsDen was:

"Instead of your usual "It has nothing to do with the EU" mindless garbage, try reading this ..."

and then quoted passages which had been inserted into the EU treaties, specifically Article 6 TEU, through the Treaty of Lisbon which came into force on December 1st 2009.

The last paragraph in those quoted passages being:

"3. Fundamental rights, as guaranteed by the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and as they result from the constitutional traditions common to the Member States, shall constitute general principles of the Union's law.’"

Which by itself means that it is no longer accurate to claim that such judgements from the ECHR "have nothing to with the EU", given that the EU appears to have taken on the role of enforcer for the ECHR by making its case law part of EU law and therefore putting it within the jurisdiction of the EU's own Court of Justice.

chevron

Fergus : "But Chevron, didn't I hear someone say that the prisoners would not vote in the constituency where they are, but in the constituency where they were, prior to being housed at Her Majesty's pleasure, where they voted previously?"

This has certainly been suggested, but it would be quite a nightmare to administer, I think. As I understand it, the govt is still wondering what to do about it.

Better would be to have a "Prisons" constituency that returns its own MP. If the main parties refuse to field a candidate, one would end up with some (probably loony) independent that everyone else in the HoC can happily ignore, yet we have simultaneously abided by the ruling.

Probably work out far cheaper on administration, too.

Liberal and Tory

As a socially liberal Tory, I believe that prisoners should get the vote.

The main argument against it is that prisoners have broken the social contract and therefore they lose their right to be involved in society.

Our punishment system is focused on proportionate sentencing, which is that the punishment should fit the crime. There are many in prison on short sentences for offences such as shoplifting and regulatory offences such as speeding offence. Is it proportionate that these people, along with all the serious offenders, also lose their right to vote even though it is disproportionate to their crime? They had their right to liberty removed (and that isn't just being locked up but also includes not seeing their families, not going to work, not eating what they want and not choosing how they spend their days), but why should they also have their right to vote removed, as a blanket ban?
In countries where citizens have had to fight for their vote and for their right to partake in democracy, like South Africa, prisoners are allowed to vote. But in the UK, where democracy is taken as a given, the removal of the right to vote is not considered such an imposition. Why is this?
If you go and visit a prison, you will see lots of people who are products of the state - having been in care, on benefit, reliant on social housing in the outside world. Nevertheless, they are not participants in the state's democratic processes.

I believe that the right to vote should be used as an incentive to engage these individuals in democracy, rather than providing them another excuse to be a victim rather than a participant.

It is an important step to get individuals to develop and individual and civic responsibility. Not on its own, but as a whole package that works. It will benefit us all.
(approximately 50,000)

Mike

A lot of people seem to be a little bit blinded by their EU hatred. I share the dislike for German (or Franco-German) ruled EU, which subjugates the interests of the UK and so many other countries (more recently, the so-called PIIGS) to the Berlin-Paris axis agenda.

Yet, the ECHR is not the EU, and it is not part of the EU. It is simply about human rights. And this is not a question about EU interference. It's a question of us (as a country) being committed to defending and respecting human rights, together with a handful of nations, some of which can still unfortunately teach us a lot about democracy.

Mike

"There are 16 European countries where there is no ban on prisoners voting. They include Spain, Sweden, Denmark and Portugal.Prisoners are banned from voting in 13 further countries including the UK, Russia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria and Georgia."

Who should we side with? Certainly the model (Putin-)democracy of Russia...