Which Prisoners can Vote on 4 July?

 

The General Election on 4 July 2024 is the second since the UK settled the prisoner voting cases in the European Court of Human Rights. In the Hirst group of cases, the Court found that the blanket, automatic restriction on all convicted prisoners voting in parliamentary elections violated Article 3 of Protocol No. 1 to the European Convention on Human Rights which requires that elections ensure the free expression of the opinion of the electorate in the choice of the legislature. 

After years of toing and froing, in November 2017 then Justice Secretary David Lidington somehow managed to satisfy the Council of Europe that some very minimal administrative reforms brought the UK into compliance. Voting rights were extended to prisoners released on temporary licence (so-called ROTL) who are in the community on the date of an election. Lidington estimated this would affect up to 100 convicted prisoners but at the time of the 2019 election I thought the number might in practice be at the low end of the range.

This will be the first General Election since the Prison Service published its “Restrictions on Prisoner Voting Policy Framework” in 2020 which sought to clarify the position. So where does this leave prisoners’ rights to vote on 4 July?

As before the Hirst cases, remand prisoners (both untried and convicted but unsentenced) will be eligible to vote- there were 16,458 at the end of March 2024 (considerably more than the 9,512 at the end of September 2019).  

Prisoners released under Home Detention Curfew (2,169 at the end of last week) also have the right to vote as do those detained for matters such as non-payment of council tax or contempt of court. There were 412 non- criminal prisoners at the end of March, but the figure may include people held under the Immigration Act who do not qualify to vote.  The small number of fine defaulters in jail are to be also able to vote if they wish.

To get an idea of the numbers subject to release on temporary licence who may be eligible to vote, 4,500 individual prisoners were on ROTL at some point during the last three months of 2023, but the numbers in the community on the dates necessary to register and to vote will be much lower- hence Lidington’s estimate of less than 100.  

In addition, there are an unknown number of prisoners in the community subject to end of custody supervised licence, the emergency early release provision introduced and extended to cope with overcrowding pressures. As things stand, they seem ineligible to vote but arguably should be allowed to.  

Eligibility is of course only one part of the story. In order to cast their ballot, an eligible prisoner must register to vote, in this case by 18 June. Some may already be registered. For those who wish to register, the Prison policy makes clear that “no convicted prisoner can register to vote when they are in prison, including those who anticipate being on HDC or ROTL at the time of an election. Prisoners on HDC or ROTL are only eligible to register to vote once they are in the community and become ineligible again upon any return to prison”.

As for where they register vote, some eligible prisoners may be able to register to vote at their home address, others by making a declaration of local connection based on having a significant link to a particular locality. Eligible prisoners may be able to register to vote giving the address of the prison establishment where they are held, but this does not apply to prisoners on HDC and ROTL. Whether or not prisoners are able to register in these ways will be subject to the discretion of Electoral Registration Officers, the Council officials who maintain the electoral roll.

Once these hurdles are crossed, there is the voting itself. Convicted prisoners on HDC and ROTL who have registered can vote in the normal way or apply for a postal or proxy vote. Remand, civil prisoners and fine defaulters can apply to vote by post or by proxy from prison. Staff should ensure relevant application forms for absent voting are available to prisoners if requested.

There is nothing in the Policy Framework about whether prisoners can vote in person in prison. There is a strong case for the ERO to make such arrangements, particularly in prisons with large numbers of remand prisoners. Wandsworth has more than 600 remand prisoners. I’d be interested to know the practice.

For those interested in the topic, a useful article on The Administrative Disenfranchisement of Prisoners in England and Wales was published in the Prison Service Journal last year.