Prisoners as Citizens in a Democracy

Prisoners as Citizens in a Democracy

DEBORAH CHENEYSenior Lecturer in Law, University of Kent, Canterbury; Patron of UNLOCK,

the National Association of Reformed Offenders

Abstract: This article looks at voting rights for sentenced prisoners in the UK. A numberof approaches are adopted by governments of the Council of Europe and the UK is one of13 member states which operate a blanket ban on prisoners voting. Following a EuropeanCourt of Human Rights judgment in 2006, the UK is now obliged to review this policywhich has been held to breach an individual’s right to contribute to free elections. Theoptions open to the UK are to retain prisoner disenfranchisement or enfranchise certainserving prisoners based on criteria such as sentence length and offence seriousness.

Historically, refusing the right to vote to prisoners has been asserted byvirtue of a historical precedent calling for their ‘civic death’. However, itcould be argued that retention of this status quo has been less a matter ofprisoners losing a moral authority to engage in the electoral process, than,in fact, a means of perpetuating the myth that ‘The higher and middlingorders are the natural representatives of the human race’ (Thompson1984, p.905).

Certainly the history of voting in England has been one based uponprivilege. Prior to the Reform Act 1832, only those with property of acertain value were entitled to vote and the Act extended the franchise tocertain householders. The Representation of the People Acts 1983 and1985 enshrined the concept of loss of citizenship for offenders, which wasinitially introduced by the Forfeiture Act of 1870. That said, by 1870, notonly was suffrage not universal, those incarcerated were hardly likely tohave met the necessary qualifications, so why was this made a specificprovision? Section 2 of the Act held that conviction for treason or felonywas grounds for disqualification from offices held, being elected as amember in the Houses of Parliament and voting either as a member orexercising any right of suffrage. Perhaps then, it was designed more tosignal ‘civic death’ and lack of moral authority for those in positions ofresponsibility, or as Members of Parliament, who had, by their actions,rather sullied those ‘natural representatives of the human race’. Theirpunishment would be to join the ranks of the common man who had yet toattain the vote at all. Now, in an age of universal suffrage with calls forincreasing electoral participation, should prisoners be denied the voteupon the questionable grounds that the Forfeiture Act of 1870 had singled

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them out? Certainly it was this historical tradition which was relied uponheavily by the government in response to the Grand Chamber of theEuropean Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), which had ruled in favour of aprisoner challenging the practice of excluding prisoners from the electoralprocess.

The first ‘breakthrough’ in the UK with regard to the possibility ofsentenced prisoners being able to vote, came a year after a serving prisoner,John Hirst, was successful in a unanimous Chamber judgment before theEuropean Courts on 30 March 2004 ((No.2), Application No. 74025/01). InApril 2005, the UK appealed against the decision to the Grand Chamber,and it was their judgment, upheld by twelve votes to five, that there hadbeen a violation of Article 3 of Protocol No.1, as a result of the UK blanketban on sentenced prisoners voting in elections.

In December 2006, the Department for Constitutional Affairs publisheda Consultation Paper, advancing potential options open to the government,in light of the decision of the Grand Chamber in Europe. These include:

� Retain the current ban on voting rights for convicted prisoners� Enfranchise prisoners sentenced to less than a specified term� Allow sentencers to decide on withdrawal of franchise� Enfranchise all tariff-expired life sentence prisoners. (Department for

Constitutional Affairs 2006b, CP29/06, pp.23–5)

The Consultation Paper makes it clear that the government retains theview that a blanket ban should remain in operation.

The main thrusts of the government’s appeal to the European GrandChamber were, in short:

� Article 3, Protocol 1 of the Human Rights Act (HRA) 1998 does notcarry with it an absolute right to vote and thus the Contracting Statesare afforded a wide margin of appreciation, as demonstrated by thevariety of approaches in European states.

� The approach taken by the Chamber that the current position wasborne of ‘passive adherence to a historic tradition’1 was an unfoundedclaim.

� The Chamber had made no previous criticism of the restrictionimposed by the UK, amongst 13 other countries in Europe, with-holding the vote from serving, sentenced prisoners.

� The Chamber erroneously concentrated its views on two precedentcases from Canada and South Africa which were not relevant.2

� The Chamber overlooked the fact that the applicant would haveremained barred from voting even if the government had restricted aban to those sentenced for the most serious offences. Such a finding wastherefore ‘offensive to many people’.3

� The Chamber had mistakenly estimated the number of prisonersaffected by the blanket ban (48,000) and failed to take into accountthose on remand who are not disenfranchised.

� The Chamber had considered the submission by a third partyintervener, the Advice on Individual Rights in Europe (AIRE) Centre,

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which claimed that the Council of Europe recommendation on themanagement of life prisoners, whose guiding principles, whilst notmaking reference to extending the vote to prisoners, nonethelesssupported such an extension. The recommendation is not binding and,as acknowledged, makes no reference to voting.

� As the prisoner in the particular case was serving a life sentence, anyban tailored to a lesser sentence would provide no benefit to him, andthe decision did not therefore result in a disproportionate impact uponhim.

� The disqualification from voting rights reflects the repercussions ofbreaching the social contract and therefore encourages civic respon-sibility and respect for the rule of law in the offender. It also pursues thejoint criminal justice aims of punishment and deterrence.

� The Chamber fails to offer a detailed remedy for the allegedincompatibility of Article 3, Protocol 1.

A number of these arguments used at their unsuccessful appeal to theGrand Chamber forms the basis of the way forward favoured by thegovernment. These basic arguments can be grouped under a number ofgeneral headings.

Firstly, enfranchisement flies in the face of adherence to traditions ofpunishment and its practice in the UK, traditions which had not previouslybeen questioned by the European court. It would also undermine thepunishment element which attends upon any sentence.

Secondly, the effect of the arbitrary nature of the ban on prisonernumbers was overestimated by the Grand Chamber, as exceptions to theban would ensure that not all prisoners are affected. Those who areaffected will be encouraged toward civic responsibility by the ban.

Thirdly, even if the government had in place restricted voting rights forcertain prisoners, it was highly likely that the prisoner at the heart of thiscase would not have benefited anyway and the finding of the Chamber wasthus ‘offensive to many people’.

History, Tradition and Objectives of Punishment

The Chamber accused the UK government of ‘passive adherence totradition’ on the basis of what they saw as:

no evidence that Parliament has ever sought to weigh the competing interests [nor]any substantive debate by members of the legislature on the continued justificationin light of modern day penal policy . . . .4

This is a strong point, well made, and which the government could onlyineffectually counter by stating that this adherence to a historic stance hadbeen with the ‘explicit approval of Parliament, most recently in theRepresentation of the People Act 2000’.5 But, is a claimed ‘explicitparliamentary approval’ actually synonymous with a reasoned rationaleborn of considered debate? It seems more likely that passive acceptance ofwhat was introduced by the Forfeiture Act would be held in perpetuity,

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without any consideration of an 1870 ruling still being valid in the 21stCentury.

A House of Commons Standard Note issued in February 2006 advancesthe argument that serious consideration was given to the position ofserving prisoners (White and Rees 2006). The Note points to an exchangeduring parliamentary questions in 2003 which, in turn, quoted a 1999Working Party on Electoral Procedures. In the exchange in the House ofLords in 2003, the, then, Minister of State for the Home Office made anumber of revealing points significant to the recent findings in Europe.These were that the 1999 Working Party:

could find no reason to change the existing system in which convicted prisonersfound guilty of a crime serious enough to warrant imprisonment are denied theright to vote for the duration of their imprisonment. (White and Rees 2006, pp. 3–4)

The exchange went on to record that prisoners ‘have a variety of ways inwhich they can express their views about conditions in prison’ (p.4). TheMinister concluded that ‘long-standing precedent set by the ECtHRupholds that certain sections of society, including convicted prisoners, canbe excluded from voting’ (p.4).

In fact, on the first point, the 1999 Working Party (Home Office 1999)acknowledged ‘our terms of reference do not formally allow us to considerthe present restriction of the franchise for convicted prisoners’ (point2.3.10). It is hardly surprising then, that they accepted the government’sview. The second point which was advanced in the House of Lords is verytelling indeed, directly linking (in the mind of the government) the desireof prisoners to vote, with their wish to complain about prison conditions.This begins to look a much less ‘honourable’ stance than the adherence to avalid theory of punishment which the government argued before theGrand Chamber. It is, quite simply, a disingenuous remark presuming thatthe only thing likely to motivate prisoners to vote would be potentialimprovement of prison conditions. This not only insults their intelligencebut polarises them, even in their very thinking, from an informed andresponsible society generally. On a baser level, it completely disqualifiesprisoner complaints from a serious arena of discussion, and suggests theyhave a callous indifference to any government policies which might actuallyaffect their families outside of prison walls.

Regarding the final claim that a historical approach by the ECtHR is an‘explicit approval’ of retention of the ban, the government is echoing themotives the Grand Chamber actually attributed to them and which theyrailed against. Equally it is an argument which does nothing to address thevalid point of the Grand Chamber in respect of the necessity to take onboard modern day penal policy. It certainly would not be the first time thatthe government had taken on board criticism of blanket policies, asdemonstrated by the issue of the maximum number of weeks animprisoned mother might keep her child in a mother and baby unit,when the UK Court of Appeal had admonished the government anddemanded greater individual flexibility in accord with human rights(Woolf 2003, pp.6–7). In the light of this, it seems to me not an insignificant




fact that, at the same time the UK appealed against the Hirst decision tothe Grand Chamber, it announced that intermittent prisoners (a custodypilot scheme subsequently abandoned in November 2006) would indeedbe able to vote. This extension of the vote to those serving intermittentcustody may have been a hopeful crumb to be thrown before the EuropeanCourts as a palliative, no-one can say, but I believe it to be an instance ofseeing ‘the writing on the wall’ in respect of current adherence to outdatedtradition.

The government’s argument is that if leading prisoners to the goal ofbecoming responsible citizens is a critical element in reintegrating theminto society (rehabilitation), alienating prisoners from citizenry throughdisenfranchisement must be part of the punishment (just deserts/retribution). However, this position is also undermined as the blanketban on voting rights for convicted prisoners cannot be held to be part ofpunishment in every case. As the government Consultation Paperacknowledges, in the case of Hirst himself, the ECtHR pointed to the factthat ‘he had served that part of the sentence relating to punishment . . .Disqualification from voting could therefore not be seen in this case asbeing justified any longer as part of his punishment’ (Department forConstitutional Affairs 2006b, point 19(e), p.13). There is also the widerissue that, if it is indeed regarded as a mechanism of deterrence to theoffender, there appears to have been no research to back this up.

Arbitrary Nature of the Ban has Limited Effect

The European Court was concerned at the arbitrary effects of the blanketban and the numbers of prisoners affected. The government relied uponthe fact that exceptions to the blanket ban meant that numbers were muchsmaller than the Chamber envisaged. However, the claim by thegovernment of limited numbers of prisoners being disadvantaged ispremised upon numerical terms. I would argue that each and everyprisoner is affected by the blanket ban because it quite simply under-mines the very core of their rehabilitation and resettlement into thecommunity.

The government relied largely upon the traditional argument of moralauthority to justify the ban, that the right to vote is part of the socialcontract and, should someone break that contract and be imprisoned as aresult, they should not benefit by having a voice in the government of thatcontract. A moral high ground certainly, but then it is one rendered rathershaky by the fact that, as the Grand Chamber states: ‘It cannot simply beassumed that whoever serves a sentence has breached the social contract’.6

Equally, not everyone who commits an offence and is imprisoned becomesdisenfranchised. British citizens convicted and imprisoned abroad have theright to vote in UK elections, prisoners who are serving sentence forcontempt of court or who have defaulted in paying a fine have been able tovote since the passage of the Representation of the People Act (RPA) in1969, and the RPA 2000 extended the franchise to those unconvictedprisoners on remand. It is strange indeed, that a citizen who strikes at the



very heart of the Rule of Law by being held in contempt of court, isnonetheless able to vote whilst serving sentence, whilst someone servingsentence for a strict liability offence (where no guilty mind is required)cannot.

The blanket ban also makes nonsense of the Home Office pledge that‘correctional services have a part to play in making offenders more activecitizens themselves . . . At any one time up to 1,500 prisoners are carryingout community projects’ (Home Office 2003, p.31). These projects are notdeemed part of the ‘punishment’ element of sentence; rather they arerehabilitative and are an integral part of the Home Office’s civil renewalunit programme.

In May 2003, a ‘Volunteering and Active Citizenship Conference’ washeld at HMP Leyhill, organised by the prison service, Prison Reform Trust,Prisons Community Links Charity and CLINKS. The Prison Reform Trustrecorded that one of the aims was to ‘increase awareness of the potential forprisoners to become volunteers and active citizens’ (Prison Reform Trust2003, p.1). This latter emphasis on prisoners being active citizens wasvoiced a year earlier by the, then, Home Secretary, David Blunkett, when,speaking of the importance of prisoners volunteering, he argued that thisnot only empowers them, but ‘strengthens the bonds between individuals. . . and in doing so it helps create a sense of citizenship’ (Prison ReformTrust 2002, p.1). Encouraging prisoners to be active citizens even formspart of prison regimes in a third of all prisons in England and Walesthrough the operation of prison councils (Solomon and Edgar 2004),which, as the Prison Reform Trust acknowledged in 2004: ‘is a way ofpromoting active citizenship and encouraging prisoners to be moreresponsible. Both play a critical role in the rehabilitation of prisoners’(Solomon and Edgar 2004, p.1). Many European states share the view thataccess to voting rights lays a foundation for successful rehabilitation and, asa Corrections Department Chief-Advocate has stated in the US: ‘Thisserves to keep the individual involved in current affairs, and connected tothe community and his or her family during their sentence’ (AmericanCivil Liberties Union 2006, pp.5–6).

Thus the government revels in the use of the rhetoric of citizenshipwhen speaking with pride of the part it plays in the rehabilitation andresettlement of prisoners, a part recognised by their own social exclusionunit, yet that same government denies them full citizenship in practice. Itseems something of a contradiction (if not a cruel game) to virtually ‘thrust’active citizenship forward during a prisoners’ sentence as a crucial elementto be practised for resettlement, whilst alienating them from, arguably, themost important role of being an active citizen. It also seems to be aparticularly self-defeating position for the government to adopt when weconsider that research findings:

have shown that, among those who have been arrested, people who vote are onlyhalf as likely to be re-arrested as those who don’t; that is, voters recidivate one-halfas often as non-voters. (C. Uggen and J. Manza, quoted in American Civil LibertiesUnion 2006, p.6)




Public Opinion

As stated earlier, one of the objections by the government to the GrandChamber decision in Hirst was that the Chamber overlooked the fact thatthe applicant would have remained barred from voting even if thegovernment had restricted a ban to those sentenced for the most seriousoffences. Such a finding was, in their view, as quoted earlier: ‘offensive tomany people’. This is an interesting choice of words and prompted therather tart response in the concurring opinion of Judge Caflisch:

That may well be so, but the decisions taken by this Court are not made to please orindispose members of the public, but to uphold human rights principles.7

This lies at the very heart of why the practice of refusing voting rights tothe majority of sentenced prisoners has continued since the passing ofthe Representation of the People Act 1969. The above words of thegovernment suggest what the court in Europe shrewdly deduced to be aclinging to ‘automatic disenfranchisement based purely on what mightoffend public opinion’.8

The shame lies in the fact that these reasons have been echoed bysuccessive governments, whatever their political colouring, over manyyears. This all-party adherence to the ‘tradition’ speaks volumes of thescant interest administrations have directed toward prisoners. I believe italso suggests that governments have neither debated the enfranchisementof prisoners, nor given it any thought, because they steadfastly believed nochallenge would be viable. This is demonstrated by the fact that, inSeptember 2000, just a month before the coming into effect of the HRA1998, the prison service was speaking in terms of rigorously defendingwhat they considered were ECtHR-proof policies (Cheney 2001, p.197).Such dismissive rhetoric used in respect of prisoners’ concerns has ahistory. It has long been the case that a member of the general publicstalwartly standing against bureaucratic excesses of government becomessomething of a hero, whilst a prisoner complaining in the same vein ismerely a troublemaker behind prison walls who can be ignored, regardlessof the legitimacy of what they have to say. The reality to be faced by thegovernment of today is that ‘Human Rights come with true democracy,whether the government wants them or not’ (Woolf 2003, p.3).

Only in recent years, with the introduction of the prisons ombudsmanoffice, the strong chief inspectorate of prisons, and powerfully informednon-statutory organisations, have complaints by prisoners been takenseriously. Through these mechanisms being in place, prisoners have slowlybut steadfastly (albeit in some cases painfully) accrued more access tojustice for their complaints than ever before. Regimes at last started toconsider prisoners as individuals rather than an amorphous mass, andfostered self-respect and individual strengths. The ‘treat with humanity’pledge on every prison gate became less of an empty promise, and humanetreatment entered prison gates in real practical terms. Once prisonersattracted the humanity they deserved, even to the minimal respect of beingaddressed as ‘Mr/Mrs/Ms’, it was a short step to their rightfully benefiting



extensively from the protections of the HRA. As the Grand Chamberpoints out, there is:

. . . no question that a prisoner forfeits his Convention rights merely because of hisstatus as a person detained following conviction. Nor is there any place under theConvention system, where tolerance and broadmindedness are the acknowledgedhallmarks of democratic society, for automatic disenfranchisement based purely onwhat might offend public opinion.9

Prisoners as Citizens

Citizenship is a status/concept which most people really don’t consciouslythink about until someone tells them that they might just not be able tohave ‘it’ any more. Most of us probably would not even be able to define theterm, other than to say the word ‘citizen’ appears on the front of ourpassport and that any ethnic monitoring form includes a box to ticklabelled ‘British citizen’. If pressed in respect of what ‘rights’ might attendcitizenship, perhaps the majority would suggest that citizenship is mostmanifest in a right to vote. However, when politics and the media resoundwith the news that prisoners should be enfranchised, the phrase ‘prisonersto have the vote’ becomes a catalyst to excessive pontificating to preservethe right to vote for the law-abiding.

It is enlightening to look at what the government promises are the fruitsof British citizenship. Introducing the test for British citizenship on itswebsite, it claims that becoming a citizen:

means you will have:

� The right to a British passport� The right to vote in national elections� The opportunity to play an active role in your community and wider

society. (Available at: http://www.lifeintheuktest.gov.uk (accessed 17 Janu-ary 2007))

It would therefore seem that serving prisoners are actually deprived ofonly one of these: namely, the right to vote.

Certainly not all serving prisoners have their passports immediatelyimpounded or cancelled. As far as playing a community role is concerned,there are examples aplenty of prisoners contributing in this way withresettlement schemes fostering strong links within the local communitywhilst a prisoner is serving his or her sentence.

Ironically, every ostensible ‘civic gain’ for prisoners has also becometheir loss. With every new innovation behind prison walls, elements of themedia are quick to whip up public opinion which damns the facilities andopportunities they are being given, ignoring the part this plays in reducingreoffending. It would be a brave politician who ‘made matters worse’ bytelling the public that their inalienable right to vote would be wrapped upas a gift for prisoners also. In the event, hunger for potential votes hasalways won over political courage in this arena, and has done so forsuccessive governments. Indeed, one perspective on the government’s




recent approach in Europe suggests this to be reflected in the government‘buying time’:

because of the proximity of the [Hirst] decision to the UK’s general election . . . thegovernment did not want to be the one that gave the vote to [all] prisoners withoutsome distance from the event.10

In the rhetoric of ‘votes for prisoners’, successive governments haveblindly relied upon a tradition of ‘no vote’ rather than rationally exploringeither the intention behind this denial of a political voice, or the potentialimpact of prisoners being given the vote. As we have seen from the findingsof the 1999 working party, finding ‘no good reason to change the existingsystem’ was not based upon any assessment of the original basis ofdisenfranchising prisoners.

The current disenfranchisement of prisoners is riddled with incon-sistencies by virtue of how it operates and, as such, makes a logicalnonsense of the current position. It certainly flies in the face of the findingsof the 1998 Select Committee on Home Affairs that increasing participa-tion in elections should be encouraged, and ways identified to make thepolitical process relevant to modern circumstances. That same Committeeraised concern that young people comprised a group with the lowest levelof registration posing ‘a danger of the development of a whole generationof people uncommitted to the democratic process’ (House of Commons1998, para. 37). This sector of the population has large numbers in prisonand is therefore highly disadvantaged with regard to political representa-tion.

The ad hoc application to some prisoners, but not all, is neither fair norrational, nor is the fact that the sentencing lottery varies between areas andrenders some offenders spared incarceration for an offence for whichothers will face incarceration and denial of the right to vote. However,perhaps a more troubling consideration with regard to fairness andrationality is the threat posed to the very heart of democracy in the unevendisenfranchisement impacting on the participation of certain groupswithin the political process. There is a racial dimension to this matter. It is afact that non-white prisoners are unevenly represented within the prisonpopulation and therefore we face the unpalatable fact of a minority interestgroup being further distanced from society. If governments are to avoidbeing accused of perpetuating this, in a climate where racial tension is onlysimmering under the surface, they need to take this inherent effect veryseriously indeed.

Similarly, serious contemplation needs to be given to how affording thevote to prisoners pans out long term. Mentioned earlier was the long-termdetriment of alienating young voters from a democratic process, some-thing which can result in their seeking an alternate avenue to socialinclusion. For prisoners as a whole, the inability to vote decreases thechances of successful reintegration into society and must therefore increasethe chances of reoffending. If actual protection of the public, rather thanconcern for public opinion, was uppermost in the mind of the government,the logical way forward would be to give the vote to prisoners.



In the light of the ECtHR Grand Chamber decision in Hirst, the politicaldilemma for the government of the day is to balance the necessity to accordwith Convention rights against neither offending public opinion, norforgetting that a current estimated 48,000 prisoners would be eligible tovote. The consultation document proffers a number of ways forward:retaining the current status quo, basing disenfranchisement on sentencelength, or ‘passing the buck’ to the judiciary to determine voting status atthe sentencing stage.

What must be borne in mind by the government is the need to avoidtheir ‘double-speak’ where aspirations and claims are not met in practice.In 2006, the Lord Chancellor was asked by the government to review theimpact of the implementation of the HRA 1998 in the UK. Looking at theissue of policy formation, Lord Falconer recorded how the Act has had apositive impact on the citizen/State relationship (Department for Constitu-tional Affairs 2006a):

In particular . . . the Act has led to a shift away from inflexible or blanket policiestowards those which are capable of adjustment to recognise the circumstances andcharacteristics of individuals. (p.4)

Yet only nine months before this claim of renewed flexibility appeared inprint, the government was waiting for a decision in their appeal to theGrand Chamber of the ECtHR, in the case of Hirst v. The United Kingdom(see note 1 for details). Its aim in pursuing an appeal in this case was tomaintain a status quo, precisely the opposite to the move away from blanketpolicies recorded by Lord Falconer.

On the matter of what is deserving of government attention, LordFalconer placed great importance on balancing the rights of all concernedin complex situations, a tailored approach which:

should have a positive and beneficial impact upon the relationship between thecitizen and the State: the Human Rights Act can be seen as part of a frameworkwhich promotes greater personalisation . . . . (Department for Constitutional Affairs2006a, p.21)

He specifically acknowledged the effect of the HRA with regard tooperational decision making in prisons, leading to policies ‘which treatprisoners individually in terms of a number of factors . . . rather than via a‘‘one size fits all’’ approach’ (Department for Constitutional Affairs 2006a,p.26). These particular stated aims appear completely polarised to seekingto retain a divisive blanket ban on voting.

The position of serving prisoners as citizens of our society must now takecentre stage. If they are to be excluded from the right to be a full citizen in ademocracy, we need better reasons for it than either a mindless following oftradition or a concern about losing votes. In the words of Lord Woolf(2003):

The real test of the HRA arises when individuals or minorities attract theantagonism of the majority of the public. When the tabloids are in full cry. Then, thecourts must, without regard for their own interests, make the difficult decisions thatensure that those under attack have the benefit of the rule of law. At the very heart




of the HRA, is the need to respect the dignity of every individual by ensuring he orshe is not subject to discrimination. (p.10)

The very impetus behind prison service policy has been, in recent years, toembrace a forward-looking goal of new challenges for offenders whichprovide a foundation for social rehabilitation. Retaining a blanket ban quitesimply undermines this aim. The prison service itself has advanced hugelyin its retraining and resettlement focus, and many staff work hard to enableprisoners to achieve goals during their sentence which will help them breakthe cycle of reoffending. There has been much in the way of successivegovernment policy that often undermines, but has never deterred, thisday-to-day work. This is largely because prison service staff must recogniseeach prisoner as an individual. Now is an ideal opportunity for thegovernment to do the same by removing the blanket and, by modernstandards poorly debated, disenfranchisement of prisoners.

It has been made clear in this article that affording the right to vote toserving prisoners is not merely a matter of electoral reform. The issue alsoembraces ministerial accountability, the rehabilitation of offenders andaddressing disproportionate representation in the electoral process.Clearly then, the issue of votes for prisoners goes right to the heart ofthose who are given the power to participate in the political process andthose who are disempowered.

Notes

1 Hirst v. The United Kingdom (No.2), [6 October 2005] (Application no. 74025/01), GrandChamber, European Court of Human Rights, Strasbourg, point 47, p.14.

2 Sauve v. The Attorney General of Canada (No.2), Supreme Court on 31 October 2002 andAugust and another v. Electoral Commission and others, CCT8/99:1999 (3) SA 1, theConstitutional Court of South Africa, respectively.

3 Hirst v. UK, point 49, p.144 Hirst v. UK, point 79, pp.22–3.5 Hirst v. UK, point 47, p.14.6 Hirst v. UK, point 7(b), p.30.7 Hirst v. UK, Annex A, point 4, p.30.8 Hirst v. UK, point 70, p.20.9 Hirst v. UK, point 70, p.20.

10 Bobby Cummines, UNLOCK, 23 August 2005, quoted in American Civil LibertiesUnion 2006, document, p.21.

References

American Civil Liberties Union (2006) Out of Step with the World: An Analysis of FelonyDisfranchisement in the US and Other Democracies, New York: American Civil LibertiesUnion.

Cheney, D. (2001) ‘Prisoners’ rights’, in: D. Cheney, L. Dickson, R. Stillbeck, and S.Uglow with J. Fitzpatrick (Eds.), Criminal Justice and the Human Rights Act 1998,London: Jordans.

Department for Constitutional Affairs (2006a) Review of the Implementation of the HumanRights Act, London: Department for Constitutional Affairs.

Department for Constitutional Affairs (2006b) Voting Rights of Convicted PrisonersDetained within the UK: The UK Government’s Response to the Grand Chamber of the



European Court of Human Right’s Judgement in the Case of Hirst v. The United Kingdom,CP29/06, London: Department for Constitutional Affairs.

Home Office (1999) Final Report of Working Party on Electoral Procedures, London:Home Office.

Home Office (2003) Active Citizens, Strong Communities: Progressive Civil Renewal,London: Home Office Communications Directorate.

House of Commons (1998) Electoral Law and Administration (Home Affairs Committee–Fourth Report of Session 1997–98, HC768), London: House of Commons.

Prison Reform Trust (2002) Barred Citizens: New Approach Needed in Prisons to ReduceReoffending, London: Prison Reform Trust.

Prison Reform Trust (2003) Barred Citizens: Volunteering and Active CitizenshipConference, London: Prison Reform Trust.

Solomon, E. and Edgar, K. (2004) Having Their Say: The Work of Prisoner Councils,London: Prison Reform Trust.

Thompson, E.P. (1984) The Making of the English Working Class, Harmondsworth:Penguin.

White, I. and Rees, A. (2006) Convicted Prisoners and the Franchise (Standard Note SN/PC/1764), London: Parliament and Constitution Centre, House of Commons.

Woolf, Lord Chief Justice (2003) Human Rights and Minorities, Melbourne, Australia:The B’nai B’rith Anti-Defamation Commission Inc.

Date submitted: February 2007Date accepted: June 2007




Documents

Prisoners as Citizens in a Democracy