VOTES FOR PRISONERS IS CRIMINAL.

This morning, I heard part of William Haig's interview with Andrew Marr on BBC television. One issue they discussed was the question of votes for prisoners which it seems that most sane people consider to be ludicrous.

Our Government recently created a shiny new 'Supreme Court' to replace the judicial functions of the House of Lords, but it appears that this court is anything but supreme. The story is that Britain signed up to the 'European Convention on Human Rights' in 1950, which established a 'European Court of Human Rights', effective from September 1953; much more recently, in 1998, substantial changes to the operation of the Convention were introduced which dramatically increased the powers of the Court. Given that most of the convention is drafted in fairly general terms, most cases brought before the Court are determined according to the interpretation that the members of the Court put on the relevant articles of the Convention and the Court is, therefore, acting as a law maker rather than as a law enforcer. Our 'Supreme Court' has no power whatsoever to challenge the decisions of the European Court and is, essentially, subservient to it.

What is particularly concerning is that, in this era of 'social awareness' and 'caring', the interpretations of the members of the Court take no account of what the original signatories to the Convention envisaged and, instead, apply their own moral views to the issues before them. In the case of whether or not prisoners should have the vote, it is blindingly obvious to any rational person that anyone who has infringed the law to such an extent as to warrant incarceration has also foregone their 'human rights' beyond anything but those of a very basic nature. Giving prisoners the vote is anathema to most people in this country and our Government should tell the European Court to get lost. Hopefully, enough Members of Parliament will vote against the proposal to make it clear that this is their only option and they will then have to look for alternative courses of action.