Thursday, February 10, 2011

God's Above The Devil Yet

MPs have overwhelmingly voted to keep the ban on prisoners voting, in defiance of a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights. The House of Commons' decision is not binding, but could put pressure on ministers to go against the Strasbourg court's decision. MPs backed a motion opposing the move by a 234 to 22 - a majority of 212.


Only one thing I want to know now. Who are the 22 traitors ?

UPDATE : here (thanks Liam)

Lib Dims
Beith, Alan (Berwick)
Reid, Alan (Argyll and Bute)
Foster, Don (Bath)
Hughes, Simon (Bermondsey)
Williams, Stephen (Bristol W)
Huppert, Julian (Cambridge)
Munt, Tessa (Wells)
Brake, Tom (Carshalton)
Hames, Duncan (Chippenham)


Labour
Gardiner, Barry (Brent North)
McDonnell, John (Hayes)
Qureshi, Yasmin (Bolton SE)
Green, Kate (Stretford)
Jackson, Glenda (Hampstead)
Love, Andrew (Edmonton)
McCarthy, Kerry (Bristol)

Conservative
Bottomley, Peter (Worthing)

Green
Lucas, Caroline (Brighton Cottage)

Plaid Cymru
Williams, Hywel (Arfon)
Edwards, Jonathan (Carmarthen E)
Llwyd, Elfyn (Merioneth)

Independent
Hermon, Sylvia (North Down)



Tellers :
Jeremy Corbyn (Labour, Islington)
Lorely Burt (Lib Dim, Solihull - a former prison assistant governor)


Resolved,

That this House notes the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights in Homicidal Axe Killer v. the United Kingdom in which it held that there had been no substantive debate by members of the legislature on the continued justification for maintaining a general restriction on the right of prisoners to vote; acknowledges the treaty obligations of the UK; is of the opinion that legislative decisions of this nature should be a matter for democratically-elected lawmakers; and supports the current situation in which no prisoner is able to vote except those imprisoned for contempt, default or on remand.


Interesting voting pattern in the 'nay' (i.e. against the resolution) camp.

1) Inner city MPs from vibrant, hi-diversity areas looking to attract the vitally important criminal demographic. Mostly Labour.
2) a cluster round Bristol/Bath/Chippenham/Wells - mostly Lib Dim
3) Lib Dims - more voted nay than Labour MPs. Split between the old rural, low-crime non-conformist heartlands, and SWPL, low-crime, low-diversity towns (Cambridge, Wells, Chippenham)
4) Plaid Cymru - again, rural, low-crime, formerly-nonconformist areas.

14 comments:

banned said...

And why were 400 absent?

Laban said...

frit

Liam said...

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm/cmtoday/cmdebate/20.htm

JuliaM said...

Kerry McCarthy, the NuLabour 'Twitter Czar (Czarina?)' who got herself in trouble by Tweeting electoral results ahead of time, has announced she is one.

Mark said...

Jeremy Corbyn MP- His seat includes HMPs Pentonville & Holloway (a thousand new voters?)
John McDonnell MP- is HMP Feltham in his constituency ?
Ditto re Kate Green & HMP Strangeways ?

I think we should be told.

Anonymous said...

Calling them "traitors" is inflammatory right wing rhetoric that killed a dozen people in tucson Arizona.

Sgt Troy 11th Dragoons said...

"Only one thing I want to know now. Who are the 22 traitors ?"

Traitors is pushing it but the appeal to a foreign court would certainly amount to an offence under the law of Praemunire, a good law of old England apparently not removed from the statute book till the sixties

"... introducing a foreign power into this land (England) and creating a (government within a government) by paying that obedience to papal process which constitutionally belonged to the king alone ...."

Blackstone

Whilst hanging, drawing and quartering might be somewhat severe(treason) the penalties under Praemunire would be ideal

These were the loss of all civil rights and the forfeiture of all goods and chattels

In other words they would just have to leave the country and basically piss off, but presumably being good citizens of the world they'd find somewhere or other to go

Laban said...

They prefer a foreign jurisdiction to the laws made by Parliament. What do you call them?

Anonymous said...

Calling them "traitors" is inflammatory right wing rhetoric that killed a dozen people in tucson Arizona.

I do hope you are being sarcastic anon.

You do realise that the Arizona shooter has been outed as a nutter whose only previous political standpoint would appear to be firmly on the left of the spectrum.

If the murders were politically motivated iot was from a left-wing position.

Sgt Troy 11th Dragoons said...

"Laban said...
They prefer a foreign jurisdiction to the laws made by Parliament. What do you call them"

Well I do regard them as traitors but I doubt they would have been regarded as traitors by our laws.

However Praemunire would have ensured that they were effectually extirpated, which has got to be the end-game

Laban said...

To be fair I imagine that Peter Bottomley is probably a true believer - he's always been a bit of a maverick. Maybe Sylvia Hermon too, and Glenda Jackson. The rest I guess would always support a European court against a British one.

Anonymous said...

Some leniency for those true believers then.

The the traitors can report to the Tower.

Pikestaffs all round chaps!

And think of the tourist atraction, those heads up there for all to see.

Sgt Troy 11th Dragoons said...

"And think of the tourist atraction, those heads up there for all to see."

We surely need the foreign exchange


The Blair-Booths would be a good start

"The sister-in-law of former Labour prime minister Tony Blair has said a rise in the number of Muslims in Britain would be "good for the country".

Journalist Lauren Booth - sister of Mr Blair's wife Cherie - converted to Islam last year.

And she told a conference in Colchester, Essex, that since becoming a Muslim she was a "better worker" and a "better mother" to her two daughters."

http://tinyurl.com/6947e97

Anthony Booth father of the hell-hags

"From a working-class background, he is a strong supporter of the Labour Party. He served as president of Equity, the actors' union.

He has been married four times. Booth nearly burned to death in 1979 when, during a drunken attempt to get into his locked flat, he fell into a drum of paraffin." wiki

Alf Garnett was of course 100% right

Polsceptic said...

"The House of Commons' decision is not binding, but could put pressure on ministers to go against the Strasbourg court's decision".
Oh my goodness! The decision is not binding. Oh wow! No one postures and prances like our own House of Commons.These people are specialists, experts in bamboozling the British Lumpen proletariat.Elected by imbeciles, they aim to mirror them.