Tuesday, March 02, 2010

Nuttall opposes prisoner voting

UKIP Chairman Paul Nuttall is reported as opposing prisoners getting the vote,
“Prisoners have broken their contract with society and obviously have no respect for the human rights of others, so why should we afford them the right to vote?” said UKIP MEP Mr Nuttall.
“It is another case of politically correct nonsense, which sends out the signal to criminals that society has gone soft.”
“But I fear in due course some prisoners will be able to vote because we remain bound by our Treaty obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights," he said.
Jailhouse lawyer may disagree with him here I suspect...

This is an intersting one, in that whilst I agree with Nuttall that prisoners should not have the right to vote, I agree with the JHL on the smaller point that, given the ECHR has ruled that they should be given the vote, then they should.

I agree because it is only by abiding by the law in this case that we can highlight the effect of EU legislation. Currently the Government are in breach of European law because they are frightened of the response of the public to giving prisoners the vote.

Tough. They signed up to the Charter, then they should suffer from the way it means that we cannot make our own law. At present they are merely delaying the inevitable.

2 comments:

Mike Wood said...

And if Britain withdrew from the EU then we would still be in breach of the ECHR and have to enforce the European Court of Human Rights' ruling thanks to the Government's ridiculous Human Rights Act

Gawain Towler said...

You are quite right Mike. But that can be dealt with, as long as you tie Dominic Grieve up and hide him fior the duration.

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