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House of Lords: Reform

My Lords, I have not spoken for some time, and so to ensure that my contribution is not too great a shock to your Lordships’ systems, I shall be brief. I read the White Paper with gathering dismay because it recommended a hybrid, 50:50, part-appointed, part-elected House—neither fish nor fowl. Such a House, with two different classes of Members, is fundamentally wrong since all Members should be and should be seen to be of equal status. No Member should be able to claim for his opinion or vote greater legitimacy than another. In our debate of January 2003, I claimed that the true choice lay between all appointed or all elected, and in common with the great majority of your Lordships I favoured all appointed. So the startling decision of the other place in favour of all elected is—of course I concede—tenable, but I condemn it on its merits. Commentators are united in describing the decision as ““historic””. It is also an error of historic proportions. I have two basic reasons for saying that. First, the present balance between the two Houses ensures the continuing primacy of the other place, undisturbed by a rival elected House. Our stable system of parliamentary democracy rests on a single tier of accountability of the Government to the House of Commons and through it to the people. That is the context of the consensus that the basic role of this House should remain as a revising, scrutinising and deliberative Assembly with the power to delay but not to seek to veto legislation. That limited but exacting role is best served by an appointed House, which has an appetite for it in a way that the other place does not. It is because of the nature of its membership that this House performs its core functions well and so adds distinctive value to the parliamentary process. In the other place, there are more and more professional politicians whose jobs prior to their election were often closely related to the goal of election, so that they bring less and less experience of the whole range of the world of work to the other place. The composition of this appointed House brings, at very low cost, expertise across a broad range of experience outside politics to bear on the critical evaluation of complex legislation—through, in no particular order, businessmen, farmers, scientists, academics, heads of the armed services, faith leaders, doctors, nurses, journalists, trade unionists and even lawyers, alongside highly experienced former MPs, Cabinet Ministers and civil servants. I do not claim to be exhaustive. It is the appointed nature of this House that best equips it to fulfil its core role. There can be no rational case—certainly, I have heard none—that a second elected Chamber could possibly fulfil that role as well, far less better. The White Paper itself makes a compelling case against an all-elected House. The one and only real argument against an appointed House performing the core role and functions that it does is the assertion that it is illegitimate. It is, by definition, not elected, but I do not accept that it is therefore illegitimate. The argument must be that all appointed Peers are illegitimate. However, the Government must believe that the 50:50 hybrid House that they propose would be legitimate. I share with the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, an inability to understand how appointed Peers are legitimate in a hybrid but not in an all-appointed House. I say that I see nothing illegitimate about an all-appointed House subordinate to the elected House, bringing huge collective experience to the benefit of Parliament as a whole and restraining the Executive by its penetrating revising role, but not becoming capable of rivalling the House of Commons by being equally—arguably, more—representative if the method of election, PR, could be claimed to be superior. No one would deny that we are a well functioning parliamentary democracy today merely because this House is appointed. I can see only the potential for perpetual conflict between two elected Chambers. Assurances to the contrary, I reject as head-in-the-sand politics. An elected House is uncharted territory. The Government should not embark on this as if it were a voyage of discovery but only as a journey to a predetermined destination. I invite the noble and learned Lord, when he winds up, to advise us whether he contemplates, for a wholly or substantially elected House, specifying the powers of each House in statute and prescribing the primacy of one elected place over another. How would that be enforced? Is what is contemplated an embryonic written constitution enforceable in the courts? Many other questions must be answered by the Government in detail. If a different method of election from first past the post is appropriate for election to this House, why is not equally appropriate for the other place? Will the rationale and appropriateness of the Parliament Acts be reconsidered in the context of two elected Houses? ““All elected”” literally means no life Peers, no independents, and no Bishops. Can the noble and learned Lord say unequivocally that the White Paper’s undertaking still holds good and that existing life Peers will continue to be entitled to remain for life? When a White Paper and Bill are brought in, will they be accompanied by costings of the proposals? Surely elected Members of this House will be entitled to remuneration, expenses, support facilities and accommodation equal to those for Members of the other place. I know that the cash-for-peerages allegations have besmirched this House, but those who advocate an elected House should not get away with the wrong conclusion; ““Let’s get away from this allegation by going for all, or mostly, elected regardless of the overriding merits of all-appointed””. The right conclusion is to retain all-appointed, but to legitimise appointments by putting the Appointments Commission on a statutory basis, with all appointments made under criteria laid down by Parliament, with the commission deciding the number of party and independent nominees at any time, and in compliance with criteria that any batch of party nominees, both collectively and individually, represent. At a time when the public are losing faith in conventional politics, the body politic may already have a surfeit of elected politicians in the other place, in the European Parliament, in local government, in the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly. The last thing that the electorate may want is yet another tier of elected and well-remunerated politicians. I submit that they would be content with this House as an appointed, low-cost auxiliary to the other place, provided that it is transparently appointed under criteria approved by Parliament.