Despite intense pressure from the European Court of Justice the British government may yet take a stand once again against the European Union. PM Cameron has repeatedly stated his hands are tied over the matter and he must abide by the ruling but has recently fueled the fire by saying he sees 'no reason' to allow prisoners the vote. The original plan was to allow prisoners to vote if they were serving less than 4 years but MPs are looking to, at the very least, comply in the most minimal way possible.
The reasoning behind finally caving to the EU is that prisoners have the opportunity to go to the ECJ and protest against the Parliamentary law causing the government to fork out money in compensation. Cameron believes he has no alternative in a time where he has to save as much money as possible to help the UK recover.
Prisoners, in my mind, should have the ability to request the vote if they are serving a short sentence that isn't linked to elections like electoral fraud and go through a process to decide if they are eligible. Being imprisoned is based on the removal of certain human rights in order to punish the individual, thus the rehabilitation in which the prisoner should be recondition into a better person should include the gradual reintroduction of said rights. Voting being one of them. Ultimately for this human right I feel it should be decided by a prison official or a judge designed to look out for prisoner rights. There is little point in using time as a definition, if you grant the vote straight away to those imprisoned for minor crimes what do they learn?
I genuinely hope the MPs take a stand to force Cameron to go to the ECJ and say 'Look this is how we've voted we need some sort of compromise'. There needs to be some sort of rehabilitation system but not one that allows prisoners who aren't showing that they have been reformed.
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