By Nicholas Randall, Press Association
The government will look "afresh" at how to comply with a European judgment on giving prisoners a vote, justice minister Lord McNally said today.
This week the Council of Europe's Committee of Ministers expressed "profound regret" that the last Government had not lifted the total ban on prisoners voting in time for the general election.
The previous government had been considering the issue since the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled in March 2004 that a blanket ban was unlawful.
Lord McNally told peers at question time: "The government is considering afresh the best way forward on the issue of prisoner voting rights."
He said the Government would "fully update" the European Council of its views in September.
But Labour's Lord Bach, a junior justice minister until the change of government, pointed to the discrepancy between the former views of the two parties in the ruling coalition.
"Before the election the Conservative opposition was strongly in favour of the steps taken by the then government to implement the ECHR ruling and Liberal Democrat party were equally strongly against our approach, accusing the then government of dragging its feet," he said.
"What is the view of the present government and why is there no mention in the document The Coalition: Our Programme for Government?
"Is the issue not important enough for the document or is it just too difficult?"
Lord McNally, also leader of Liberal Democrat peers, said a further ECHR ruling in April in relation to Austria had "narrowed even further the terms by which votes could be denied to prisoners".
As a result it was "perfectly reasonable" for the government to take its time to consider the matter.
But Tory ex-Cabinet minister Lord Tebbit asked: "Is there any evidence that this measure has any support outside this House amongst the general public?"
Lord McNally replied: "I'm not sure it has any support in the editorial columns of the Daily Express or the Daily Mail, but I do think that in the broader general public there is a willingness to consider the experience of other countries both in the rehabilitation of prisoners and the kind of punishment meted to them."
Former chief inspector of prisons Lord Ramsbotham, a crossbench peer, said: "The question is not who has the right to vote but who does not. That, in France and Germany, is decided in court at the time of sentence by the judge according to the crime."
Lord McNally said it was "one of the considerations" that would be taken into account.
Juliet Lyon, director of the Prison Reform Trust, said: "We welcome the Government's decision to review the outdated and unlawful ban on sentenced prisoners voting.
"We hope that the Government will now move swiftly so that prisoners will be able to exercise their right and civic duty to vote in next year's national and local elections."
