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House of Lords Bill [HL]

My Lords, I have received various communications on the Bill. The noble Lord may be referring to a Labour Party group which is committed to elections to your Lordships’ House. Although my own view on Lords reform is very well known, I cannot claim ownership of it. I have also enjoyed vigorous and helpful discussions with other groups, particularly the group chaired by Sir Patrick Cormack. We had a very enjoyable discussion only two days ago. The question of numbers is very important. If there was a change of government—an unlikely prospect but we have to consider the implications it would have for numbers—the defeated Government would have a majority of party political Peers and the commission would need to reverse the situation. I know that the Bill provides that the commission may, at its discretion, phase in the requisite number of recommendations over a period of two Sessions following a general election, but there might be pressure from the winning party for that to happen more quickly and for the majority to be towards the upper end of the 3 per cent provision. Clearly frequent changes of government—which we have not seen recently but those of us who remember the 1960s and 1970s will know that it can happen—would create a great deal of uncertainty about whether the numbers can be contained. Again we perhaps enter into the realm of fantasy, but if a party other than Labour or the Conservatives became the Official Opposition, there would then be a need to create a very large number of Peers. These matters all need to be considered. I am not saying that the principles contained around the Appointments Commission are wrong. I fully understand why the noble Lord is pursuing this. If there is to be an appointed element in the future, all the various political parties have a commitment towards such a statutory Appointments Commission, but the detail of these matters needs to be considered very carefully. On the exclusion of hereditary Peers, I have no comment to make on the technical drafting of the clause. However, I observe that it will take many years—perhaps 60 years—before all the hereditary Peers leave your Lordships’ House. At the moment we have one hereditary Peer in his 30s and six in their 40s—including, happily, the noble Lords, Lord Addington, Lord de Mauley and Lord Strathclyde.