Is the worm turning?

[kynon]

Had to stop off to fill the car up this morning (GBP66 to put 50 litres in, ouch! For any North American residents reading, that's USD8.02 per gallon, in case you felt your gasoline prices were a bit high. For the old-school Brits, that's GBP9.62 per gallon. Anyway, I digress.), and I noticed a headline on one of the newspapers arrayed in the rack

Comments

Oh for fuck sake

[thegreatgonzo]

1) This has fuck all to do with the EU this is VERY important, it is the European Court of Human Rights which was set up under the European convention on human rights which was drawn up by the council of Europe. Lots of people, including parts of the media like the Express are telling deliberate lies as part of an anti EU agenda

Re: Oh for fuck sake

[kynon]

My apologies, I am guilty of conflating the two. However (from the Council of Europe's own website) there is a European Convention on Human Rights, and a Universal Declaration on Human Rights. What's the point of having two? One would imagine they can't contravene each other, so why bother with the duplication? (Caveat: I have not read either in detail...yet

Re: Oh for fuck sake

[thegreatgonzo]

The point about the ECHR, the real value it has over the UDHR is the Court. There is a body that is actually checking that the nations that have signed up to this are playing by the rules. It is no surprise that people can get confused between the CoE and the EU given that they have an awful lot of overlap in membership but is a bad thing when the media are deliberately muddying the water as part of their little englander agenda.

Re: Oh for fuck sake

[asw909]

kynon: The flipside, of course, is that (particularly for short-term, say under four years, sentences) giving these prisoners the vote might actually be an assistance in ensuring that they might be of more use to society in future - you know, by not feeling excluded from the system (but then, more work by the Government to actually bother to do something about issues stemming from poverty, rather than cutting every scheme in sight, might help too) and feeling that they can be part of society, rather than a burden on it as a prisoner.

Also (I'm hoping thegreatgonzo might be able to confirm this), isn't it the case that MPs don't lose their seat if they go to prison for less that 12 months? If this is indeed the case, I'd have rather more confidence in the MPs vote this week if they were able to clarify why that is still in place. As that would result in the perverse situation of a jailed MP effectively being entitled to make/shape laws, but not vote for the Government that make them.

Re: Oh for fuck sake

[thegreatgonzo]

I can confirm that about MPs.

Re: Oh for fuck sake

[kynon]

Given that MPs are supposed to represent the people, and do "the right thing" for them, I would agree with it being wrong that an MP doesn't lose his/her job if they are sentenced to a year or less. I don't want any criminal being the one making the decisions that could affect everyone in the UK (are you reading, Mr Bliar? :P).

There might be merit in the vote being taken away then phased back in as release approaches. The choice on how long the sentence should be is harder - particularly if one considers the apparent disparity between sentence given & actual time served. However I'm still inclined towards the loss of voting rights being part of the punishment aspect of a jail sentence.

Re: Oh for fuck sake

[faerycake]

The disparity thing is interesting - in terms of the distinction between time served and time sentenced

Re: Oh for fuck sake

[_pinkdaisy_]

What Tony said. Especially point 1

Re: Oh for fuck sake

[kynon]

As per above, I cocked up & did my own bit of confusing the two.