Impact case study database

In 2013 prisoner voting was the defining issue in the UK’s relationship with ECHR institutions. So significant was it that a Joint Select Committee of both Houses of Parliament was established in 2013 to assess the Coalition Government’s Draft Voting Eligibility (Prisoners) Bill. Against a backdrop of increasingly politicised opposition to the European Court’s Hirst judgment, the Committee provided a unique opportunity to immerse a small group of parliamentarians in research on prisoner voting and challenge received wisdom. Murray’s published research influenced all aspects of this Committee’s work and conclusions, and has since reshaped debates on prisoner voting in Wales and Scotland.

Shaping the Joint Committee’s Influential Report

The appointment of a joint select committee to consider a specific draft Bill is exceptional, and a mark of the complexity and importance of prisoner voting. Murray was able to foreground the history of prisoners voting and explain the human rights context in sessions between September and December 2013, giving the majority a new appreciation of the issues at stake [IMP1].

In this role Murray shaped the Committee’s proceedings. As the Legal Adviser to the Committee attests, Murray not only “assisted in the task of identifying witnesses who could make valuable contributions” but also “contributed to the preparation of briefing documents and suggested questions for parliamentarians ahead of Committee evidence sessions” [IMP2]. He confirms that, in November and December 2013, Murray was involved in the “drafting of the Committee’s report”, contributing to large sections of Chapters 2, 3 and 4 (contributions to drafting are not directly attributed within Select Committee Reports) [IMP2].

A majority of the committee (including two Conservative members) supported enfranchising a substantial number of prisoners in its December 2013 Report [IMP3]. This conclusion drew directly upon the ‘historical justification’ for enfranchising prisoners serving sentences of less than one year which was highlighted by Murray’s research [PUB3] [IMP3]. As Committee member Lord Norton recognised, “[t]he majority Report was directly reliant upon Colin’s research in its conclusion that prisoners serving sentences of up to 12 months should be enfranchised” [IMP1]. The Committee’s Legal Adviser affirms that “Colin’s research findings that prisoner voting was not alien to the UK’s governance order helped to underpin the majority conclusion” [IMP2]. The adoption of this proposal alone would enfranchise some 11,000 prisoners [IMP3].

The Report received extensive media coverage, being heralded in the UK Human Rights blog as “a powerful statement of the Government’s rule of law responsibilities as well as a crushing indictment of the current policy” [IMP4]. Within civil-society, the Howard League for Penal Reform advocated for prisoner voting on the basis of the Report [IMP4]. The Report also received the backing of Parliament’s respected Joint Committee on Human Rights [IMP5], which asserted that following the Report would secure the UK’s ECHR obligations.

As a result of the Committee’s comprehensive rejection of the Government’s Draft Voting Eligibility (Prisoners) Bill, which proposed to ban all voting by any prisoners in the face of the Hirst judgment, this legislative proposal was revisited [IMP6] and was subsequently abandoned. In 2017, the UK Government adopted an administrative scheme to enfranchise day-release prisoners, drawing on “minimal-compliance” ideas explored in the Committee’s Report [IMP3] and previously developed within Murray’s research [PUB1]. As a result, some prisoners (roughly 100 on any given day) have regained their voice within the democratic process and a struggle which had so undermined the UK’s relationship with the ECHR was partially resolved.

Advancing new policy approaches in Scotland and Wales

Competences over electoral law were not devolved to Scotland and Wales until 2016/17. Murray’s evidence to the Scottish Parliament’s Equality and Human Rights Committee (February 2018) and to the Welsh Assembly’s Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee (January 2019) have shaped the subsequent debate within these jurisdictions.

In recommending that all Scottish prisoners should be enfranchised, the Equality and Human Rights Committee acknowledged the importance of the 2013 Joint Committee report [IMP7] and echoed Murray’s evidence that the UK Government’s administrative enfranchisement of a few prisoners would be unlikely to satisfy the European Court [IMP7]. The Welsh Assembly’s Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee drew on Murray’s evidence repeatedly in their report [IMP8] and explicitly relied upon his evidence as the specific basis for its conclusion that prisoners serving sentences of under four years should be enfranchised [IMP8].

Both the Welsh and Scottish Governments have responded favourably to these reports in 2019. The Welsh Government has committed to legislating for exactly the approach recommended by the Committee on the basis of Murray’s evidence [IMP9]. Its current proposals could enfranchise as many as 1,700 in Wales. The Scottish Government team working on the Scottish Elections (Franchise and Representation) Bill convened a special research briefing with Murray in August 2019. His ‘useful’ advice has influenced the presentation of the Bill, which proposes the enfranchisement of prisoners serving sentences of up to one year, to the Scottish Parliament [IMP10]. Prior to Murray’s engagement the Scottish Government relied largely upon human rights obligations to justify the new legislation, whereas Murray’s advice contributed a range of supporting arguments grounded in the nature of democracy, rehabilitation and Scotland’s autonomy. The Scottish Elections (Franchise and Representation) Act was passed in February 2020, restoring the vote for roughly 2,000 prisoners (on current figures) in Scottish Parliament and Local Government elections.