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Constitutional Reform and Governance Bill

My Lords, I will confine my remarks to Part 5 and begin by stating my strong support for the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Steel. I reluctantly accept the proposed ending of by-elections for hereditary Peers. As one of the 92, I consider myself to have been extremely lucky to be able to retain a seat in your Lordships’ House but, looked at dispassionately, it is very hard to justify heredity by itself as a qualification for membership of the upper House. However, there should be nothing to stop an hereditary Peer applying to the Appointments Commission based on personal merit. The other issue I wish to raise is the size of the House. As has been said, the House is already the second largest upper House in the world; with life membership, and a population living longer, it can only grow larger unless there are to be no further admissions, which is clearly not an option. Clause 56 allows a Peer to resign from the House and while this is a reasonable step, there seems to be no incentive to resign or retire when, as at present, Members can simply not attend or seek leave of absence. It does not seem to me that it will solve the numbers problem. I believe that the only way to address that problem is to introduce a limit of parliamentary service of, say, 20 years. This could be achieved over a transitional period of, say, five years to avoid a mass exodus. We can, I hope, discuss these issues further at the Committee stage if, indeed, there is to be one. Finally, it is most important that this House should remain fully appointed and not be replaced by an elected senate. In the next Parliament, we must stand together and resist this threat to the future of our House and the valuable service that it performs.