Exclusive Prisoners serving less than 12 months in Scotland retain their right to vote thanks to a 2020 Holyrood act HUMAN rights groups have hit out at a Tory motion aiming to strip the right to vote from people serving prison sentences of less than a year. Tories say their proposal, to be debated in the Holyrood chamber this afternoon, aims to stop the SNP making “it easy for prisoners to vote from the comfort of their cells”. Scottish Conservative justice spokesperson Liam Kerr said the plans to give some prisoners a vote in this year’s Holyrood elections are “shameful”. However, human rights groups have said the Tory motion serves "no purpose", and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has repeatedly ruled that a blanket ban on prisoner voting is unlawful.