Prisoners (Voting Rights)

Joe Benton Excerpts

Tuesday 11th January 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mr Hollobone]

As a Member of the Council of Europe my hon. Friend is closer to many of the issues than I am. I share his scepticism about the figure of £160 million, which we were given as the possible amount of compensation. I invite the Minister to justify where that figure has come from. It would be extremely irresponsible for the Government to bandy around those figures when they have no realistic basis in fact. I understand that there are 2,500 outstanding court cases, pending a resolution of this issue with the European Court. I would like to know how the Government established the basis of compensation for each of those 2,500 cases, because I strongly suspect that the Government may be guilty of making up those numbers and in danger of misleading Parliament.

This is very serious issue. The British public do not want prisoners to be given the right to vote. Many other countries in Europe successfully operate blanket bans and have not been challenged in the European Court. My constituents and many other people up and down the land are furious that once again the Government seem to be bending over to the human rights lobby to introduce a measure, which is frankly inappropriate to the balance of crime and justice in this country.

Once again, we seem to be going soft on criminal justice issues. The British people will not put up with that for much longer. Here is a golden opportunity for the new coalition Government to say, “We are going to put Britain first.” If we have to pull out of the European convention on human rights, let us consider that and possibly do so. That would certainly have a lot of support in the country. However, if we are going to respond to the appeal judgment from the European Court there are many ways of doing it other than simply applying the four-year rule, which will not address my constituents’ concerns. I say to the Government with confidence that if they continue to press this issue in the House, they will be defeated.

[Mr Joe Benton (in the Chair)]

Order. Before I call the next speaker, as a number of people have indicated they wish to speak, I propose to commence the wind-ups no later than 10.40 am.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Harper]

I, too, congratulate my newly knighted hon. Friend. He put his case in a measured and thoughtful way, as did the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green). Apart from what she said at the beginning of her remarks—that this is, indeed, a legal judgment and that we are obliged to implement it—I did not agree with her arguments, and I am afraid that the Government and I do not agree with what my hon. Friend said either.

Let me try to answer some of the questions that were raised by several Members, including the hon. Member for Rhondda. He accused the Government of gold-plating the provisions. We absolutely have not done that. We set a limit which we believe is the minimum required to comply with our obligations. Moreover, in contrast with the previous Government, who were proposing to enfranchise prisoners for all elections, we have said that we will make a change only for those elections where we are legally obliged to do so: the Westminster and European elections. We will not do it for local elections or referendums. Importantly, we will not do it for elections for police and crime commissioners, or for mayors. We will do what is legally necessary and no more. That was not what the previous Government were going to do. They proposed enfranchising prisoners for all elections. That would have perhaps had some of the consequences for local elections that Members have mentioned.

Also, we will ensure that prisoners cannot register to vote at the prison. It would clearly be inappropriate to have significant number of voters at prisons able to influence the results of elections. It is also worth saying, as my final point—

[Mr Joe Benton (in the Chair)]

Order. That concludes the debate. We must move on to the next one.