(1) The provision guarantees ‘free elections at reasonable intervals by secret ballot, under conditions which will ensure the free expression of the opinion of the people in the choice of the legislature’.

(2) Section 3(1) provides that ‘[a] convicted person during the time that he is detained in a penal institution in pursuance of his sentence ... is legally incapable of voting at any parliamentary or local election.

(3) In the Administrative Court Kennedy LJ was content to locate the origins of current English law in the Forfeiture Act of 1870 which, in the context of an expanding franchise, imposed statutory inhibitions on the right to vote for those convicted of treason or a felony. See [2001] HRLR 39 at (1]

(4) Ewald has difficulty imagining that someone undeterred by the prospect of a long prison sentence would ‘stay his hand for fear of losing the vote’. Ewald (2002], p.1102

(5) HC Hansard 13 June 2005 Col 181W.  Harriet Harman stated that these offences ‘though related to electoral matters were not specific electoral offences’.

(6) Ewald notes that ‘depicting ballot-wielding convicts as a grave threat to the body politic expresses weakness and doubt, not confidence.’ Ewald [2002], p1114.

(7) In 1980 Mr Hirst was sentenced to a term of discretionary life imprisonment for manslaughter.  His tariff expired in 1994 but he remained in detention as the Parole Board considered that he continued to present a risk to the public.

(8) Among British nationals, the rate is 7.1 per 1,000 for the black population and 3.2 per 1,000 for people of mixed ethnic backgrounds as compared to 1.4 per 1,000 population for whites.  

(9) ‘Felony Disenfranchisement removes 1.4 Million Black Men from the Voting Rolls’, Journal of Blacks in Higher Education No 22, 1998-1999.

(10) Although Easton also identifies ‘a potential disparate impact issue’ in this jurisdiction. Easton 2006, p.451

(11) The UK is one of only eight European countries automatically disenfranchising all sentenced prisoners, the others being: Armenia, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Luxembourg and Romania.

(12) It is perhaps worth noting that the UK is one of Europe’s great incarcerators, in England and Wales imprisoning 140.4 per 100,000 head of population. This is a higher rate of imprisonment than any Western European country and, in Europe as a whole, is exceeded only by Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia, Moldova, Lithuania, Azerbaijan, Poland, Romania, the Slovak Republic and Hungary. See Howard League for Penal Reform Press Release 2005.

(13) Although, in this regard, the Grand Chamber noted that the Convention system would probably not allow ‘for automatic disenfranchisement based purely on what might offend public opinion’ (Hirst v UK (No. 2) (2005] Application No. 74025/01 at [70]).

(14) Paul Goggins, Labour MP and Home Office Minister, on a visit to Brixton Prison. See http://www.lambethlabour.com/news/crime/prisonervotes.html accessed on 1 February 2006. By contrast, Mark Oaten MP, of the Liberal Democrats, stated that the ruling in Hirst was ‘not just about rights … (but] about ensuring that prisoners return to their communities as responsible citizens. Telling offenders that they have no part to play in our democracy is no way to end the cycle of crime’. See http://www.libdems.org.uk/news/story.html?id=9072&navPage=news.html accessed on 1 February 2006 and the Liberal Democrat Election Manifesto 2005, pp8-10

(15) In relation to an earlier episode in the Hirst saga, Lardy has noted the strong, symbolic value of prisoner disenfranchisement but argues that ‘[s]ociety purchases this symbolism … at the expense of its commitment to the principle of political equality.’ Lardy (2002], p528

(16) Home Office projections indicate that, at its highest, the prison population in England and Wales in 2010 may exceed 91,000 inmates. In 2000, the average prison population in England and Wales was 64,600. See Home Office 2005b and Home Office 2001.