The Government is going to have to tackle this one very soon. The EU judgement is that a blanket ban on allowing prisoners to vote is illegal but it is up to the governments of individual member states to decide which prisoners, if any, should be deprived of their vote.
David Cameron famously said that the thought of prisoners being given the vote made him"physically ill". I can't help thinking that this was something of an exaggeration. However, I can see that many people would balk at prisoners convicted of serious crimes such as murder being given the vote. However, I find the idea of allowing the vote to those serving short sentences for much more minor crimes, who probably shouldn't be in prison in the first place, perfectly acceptable.
What I don't find acceptable is the suggestion from the Tory right that the EU ruling should be ignored and the blanket ban continued. This will invite ever increasing fines – which would have to be paid from the revenues collected to run the country. MPs were no elected deliberately to act against the Human Rights Act or deliberately to waste taxpayers' money.
Finally, the argument that some other member states are not complying with this judgement is neither here nor there.