UK government plans to give some prisoners the vote

The UK government is planning to scrap in part the ban on prisoner voting, 12 years after a judgment from the European Court of Human Rights ruled it was unlawful.

Those serving sentences of less than a year will be allowed to go home to vote according to plans circulated to ministers by Justice Secretary David Lidington last week.

The Sunday Times quoted a senior government source as saying: “This will only apply to a small number of people who remain on the electoral roll and are let out on day release.

“These are not murderers and rapists but prisoners who are serving less than a year who remain on the electoral roll. No one will be allowed to register to vote if they are still behind bars.”

In 2011 MPs voted 234 to 22 in favour of a cross-party motion stating that it was for Parliament to decide on the issue.

The challenge to the ban on prisoner voting began in 2005 when John Hirst, who was serving a sentence for manslaughter, was successful at the European Court of Human Rights, which ruled a blanket ban fell would of article 3 of the ECHR.

In 2015, the European Court of Justice ruled it was lawful for countries to deprive prisoners convicted of serious crimes of the vote in a French case involving a murderer.

In that same year, Strasbourg ruled that the blanket ban affected the rights of more than 1,000 British prisoners who brought claims.