Jeremy Wright MP on - prisoners' right to vote

Jeremy Wright MP writes for the Observer

14 April 2009

THE Government is proposing to give those sentenced to imprisonment the right to vote in elections which take place while they are in prison.

I will come back to the Government’s justification for it in a moment but first let’s deal with the principle.

In principle, I believe it is wrong for prisoners to retain the right to vote. It is true that a sentence of imprisonment has several purposes, including the protection of the public and the rehabilitation of the offender, and that in connection with the latter you could argue that a prisoner’s engagement with the democratic process assists his or her reintegration into society.

But surely the primary purpose of a sentence of imprisonment is to punish the offender.

The nature of this particular form of punishment is the deprivation of liberty or more specifically the deprivation of a number of liberties normally enjoyed by citizens of this country - the liberty to go where you want to, when you want to, the liberty to go to the pub or order a takeaway as well as the liberty to vote. That is why it is a punishment and why it remains the punishment of last resort for the criminal courts.

Losing your right to vote is part of your punishment when you are sent to prison and it would be just as wrong to allow prisoners that liberty as to allow them the other freedoms which imprisonment is designed to remove.

Ministers propose too that only prisoners serving shorter sentences should retain their right to vote, but this makes no sense. If imprisonment involves the loss of your liberties, the length of the sentence reflects the severity of the punishment in that as in all other respects. As I say, in my book the loss of your right to vote is a consequence of being sent to prison. Those sent to prison for shorter periods regain it more quickly. I do not see why any further complexity needs to be added.

Of course, the Government knows that this is a bad idea, which is why they tell us they have no choice in the matter. Ministers say that the European Court of Human Rights has ruled that prisoners should retain the right to vote and the United Kingdom has to comply.

I say that if this is true, we can add it to an already long list of reasons why the Human Rights Act has, in my view, done more harm than good and why we should be rid of it as soon as possible.
Jeremy Wright, MP for Rugby

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