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Sentencing

The Secretary of State knows that I think giving the vote to any prisoners is idiotic, unjustifiable and about as popular with the general public as finding a rattlesnake in a lucky dip. As he has made great play of the rule of law, he must know that the European Court of Human Rights went way beyond what is in the convention when it made this ruling, so he might want to remind it of the obligations under the rule of the law, which are to stick to what is in the convention. It seems from his statement that he is putting the rulings of unelected, unaccountable pseudo-judges, many of whom are not even proper judges in their own country, above the views of the British public and the British Parliament. Will he at least have the

courtesy to put this to a vote of this House, to make sure that what he proposes has the consent of the British Parliament?