Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what plans Government has to implement the agreement reached by the Council of Europe on prisoner voting in the UK; how many prisoners he believes the extension set out in that agreement will apply to; and prisoners on which type of short-term licences will be eligible to vote.

For the first time, criminals when they are sentenced will be notified that while they are in prison, their punishment includes the loss of the right to vote.

We are amending prison service guidance to address an anomaly in the current system, where offenders who are back in the community on licence can vote, but those who are in the community on temporary licence and working towards their release, cannot.

In practice, it is likely that less than 100 additional offenders will be eligible to vote at any given time, based on recent data on the number of offenders released on temporary licence.

The numbers released on temporary licence, on any given day is relatively small, partly due to the rigorous risk assessment that accompanies it. This change would not enable all offenders on temporary licence to vote as they would also need to be registered to vote or be able to register to vote (and, obviously, there would need to be an election).

UK Government officials are working with colleagues in the Devolved Administrations on the implementation of these changes in Scotland and Northern Ireland. The UK Parliamentary franchise is a reserved matter but aspects of the criminal justice system is devolved.