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Voting by Prisoners

I understand the right hon. and learned Gentleman's point, and hindsight is a wonderful thing. If I thought that the only thing preventing the Court from coming to a reasonable compromise was the fact that I had not organised an earlier debate, I would be happy to be taken to Strasbourg to make my apologies. He knows better than anybody than neither set of Whips was keen on such a debate, not least because it was clear that it would be impossible, particularly in the pre-election atmosphere, to have the sober debate that we are to have today.