Prisoner votes issue a political minefield

Prisoner votes issue a political minefield

This is Gloucestershire

Tuesday, February 15, 2011, 07:00

Hitler supporter Tory Councillor Diggory Seacome

MPs have overwhelmingly backed a Commons motion to continue denying prisoners the right to vote in defiance of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).

COUNCILLOR Diggory Seacome (C, Lansdown) says the more one delves into the pros and cons of allowing convicted prisoners their voting rights, the more complicated the arguments become.

IT would be very easy to come down on one side of the fence, but when researching the facts one enters a minefield.

A simple argument is that if one has transgressed against society, one has forfeited one's right to belong to that society for a period of time, and that forfeit includes not being allowed to vote, along with other basic freedoms. However the argument is not that simple. The European Court of Human Rights ruled in 2004 that it was a basic human right to be allowed to vote, even when locked away. (Hirst v. United Kingdom). But victims have human rights as well!

MPs have overwhelmingly backed a Commons motion to continue denying prisoners the right to vote in defiance of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).

COUNCILLOR Diggory Seacome (C, Lansdown) says the more one delves into the pros and cons of allowing convicted prisoners their voting rights, the more complicated the arguments become.

IT would be very easy to come down on one side of the fence, but when researching the facts one enters a minefield.

A simple argument is that if one has transgressed against society, one has forfeited one's right to belong to that society for a period of time, and that forfeit includes not being allowed to vote, along with other basic freedoms. However the argument is not that simple. The European Court of Human Rights ruled in 2004 that it was a basic human right to be allowed to vote, even when locked away. (Hirst v. United Kingdom). But victims have human rights as well!
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The Ministry of Justice published a document of 51 pages in 2009, based on a consultation exercise, and prefaced it with the alarming fact that only 88 people had responded to the questions! Does this make it representative?

The questions posed ranged from the number of years that one has to be serving not to be entitled to vote, the type of offence, and when one's entitlement to vote should be announced (at sentencing, or automatically).

There is currently a move to allow anyone serving a sentence of under four years to have the vote, but think of the administrative problems that could be encountered here.

How does one keep up with prisoners when they are being moved about? Should they be entitled to vote at their home address, or should there be a rolling prison register? If they are to remain on the register at home, how is this marked on the register without indicating that they are 'not at home'? What about those on remand? Are we to take as the minimum the years given, or the years served (generally half those given, if good behaviour is maintained)?

Postal voting (logically the only practical method) could provide a huge opportunity for electoral fraud. This brings into question whether those convicted of electoral fraud should be allowed to vote, even though their sentence might be shorter than the minimum time set for a cut-off limit.

There is not room in the scope of this article to examine the question as deeply as one would want to, but on balance, I am against prisoners being allowed the vote, but I am sure that distinguished legal minds, in Europe will decide to allow them, with certain caveats, to exercise their right to vote. Then we will have to pick up the pieces of its administration.

Comment:

My case Hirst v UK (No2) is simple, the ECtHR ruled that all convicted prisoners regardless of the nature and seriousness of the offence and length of sentence are entitled to the human right to vote. Any attempt by politicians to deviate from the ruling and failure to fully comply with it, means that they enter a legal minefield.

Councillor Diggory Seacome misses the point. Under the HRA it is the prisoners who are the victims having their human rights abused by the State. Victims have human rights vis-à-vis the State. Victims of crime do not have human rights vis-à-vis the criminal or prisoner. Under the Convention the human rights are for the individual vis-à-vis the State, or for State v State.

Diggory Seacome refers to Labour's dodgy consultation exercise. It was not representative because it did not seek the views if prisoners. It was fraudulent in that the government had already made up its mind, and was just going through the motions. It was the same with the recent Tory motion and debate in the Commons. In any event, Frodl v Austria reaffirmed the Hirst test after the dodgy consultation exercise which renders it meaningless.

It is disgraceful in this day and age that the Tory Councillor Diggory Seacome states that he is opposed to human beings having human rights. He should be totally ashamed of himself! Article 1 of the Convention states that everybody (including prisoners) are entitled to their human rights under the Convention. Who is he to state otherwise?

In those civilised countries which do allow prisoners the vote, prisoners do so by postal vote and do so from their last known postal address before going into custody. Civilised countries have no problem with this. Only in the uncivilised UK do we have a problem with it. What the public appear to be missing is that the tyrant David Cameron wants to replace the HRA with a Bill of Responsibilities. Only if the Executive deem a subject to be responsible will they be allowed a right. However, this is the equivalent of the position in prison where prisoners only get privileges at the discretion of the prison governor.

My advise to the public is that they should be afraid, very afraid, of the Tory plan to strip prisoners of their human rights because the public will be the next in line to get theirs removed.

UPDATE:

First They Came - Pastor Martin Niemoller

First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialist
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me