Results 1-20 of 130 for speaker:Lord Wakeham

Procedure of the House — Motion to Take Note (24 April 2013)

Lord Wakeham: I will say a word or two because I was the Leader of the House when the noble Lord was the Leader of the Opposition. I listened to my noble friend putting forward a housemaid's baby-type argument; we will have a little experiment and it will be all right. I also listened to the noble Lord, Lord Grenfell. I have no doubt that if he was in charge of all this, it would work very well whatever...

Death of a Member: Baroness Thatcher — Tributes (10 April 2013)

Lord Wakeham: My Lords, I sense the mood of the House and shall be as brief as I can. I do not intend to say anything about the great issues surrounding Margaret Thatcher, but I was her Chief Whip for the whole of her second term in office, and I want to say one or two little things about what I would call the human and personal side. Frequently, late at night, I would have a long talk with her about the...

Death of a Member: Baroness Thatcher — Tributes (10 April 2013)

Lord Wakeham: My Lords-

Leveson Inquiry — Motion to Take Note (11 January 2013)

Lord Wakeham: My Lords, when I gave evidence to the Leveson inquiry, I tried to explain to Lord Justice Leveson that his report would be valuable even if the Government did not agree to the need for statutory control of the press. He replied by summarising what I was saying as tails he wins and heads he also wins. I believed that his report would be valuable in either event, and so it has proved. I am a...

Arrangement of Business — Announcement (31 October 2012)

Lord Wakeham: My Lords, in my experience there is very little that is new in this House and I have no doubt that inadmissible amendments have been tabled in the past. However, can my noble friend the Leader of the House tell me what the experience in the past in this House has been? Has the House ever voted on an inadmissible amendment and, if so, how often?

Media Standards and Media Regulation — Motion to Take Note (25 October 2012)

Lord Wakeham: My Lords, I begin by saying how pleased I am to see my noble friend Lord Younger of Leckie sitting on the Front Bench. His father was a great friend and colleague of many of us over many years and I am tempted to say that if he makes half as good a speech as his father would have made in these circumstances he will do very well indeed. I congratulate the noble Baroness who initiated this...

House of Lords: Reform — Private Notice Question (8 October 2012)

Lord Wakeham: To ask Her Majesty's Government, in the light of the Deputy Prime Minister's Statement on 3 September, what their plans are for reform of the House of Lords.

House of Lords: Reform — Private Notice Question (8 October 2012)

Lord Wakeham: My Lords, I beg leave to ask a Question of which I have given private notice.

House of Lords: Reform — Private Notice Question (8 October 2012)

Lord Wakeham: I thank my noble friend the Leader of the House for his reply. Might I assume from his Answer that the Government have no plans for further reform of your Lordships' House in this present Parliament?

Financial Services Bill — Committed to Committee (18 June 2012)

Lord Wakeham: My Lords, I do not often intervene in these matters, and no one could expect me not to understand the position of the usual channels, but I have listened to this debate with some horror. In my view, these matters should have been resolved by the usual channels and it is very disappointing that the Front Benches are unable to find a sensible and satisfactory agreement. Often, finding such an...

Queen's Speech — Debate (2nd Day) (10 May 2012)

Lord Wakeham: My Lords, it is a great pleasure for me to follow the Convenor of the Cross Benches. I have always had great respect for Convenors of the Cross Benches. I remember that when I arrived in the House as Leader the Convenor of the Cross Benches was Lady Hylton-Foster. I consulted her on the appointment of someone to an important position and said that there was a question as to whether they might...

Queen's Speech — Debate (2nd Day) (10 May 2012)

Lord Wakeham: It is another story as to why the noble Lord did not get anywhere with it. I will not bore the House with it now, but he and I know many of those reasons. The main lesson of my report has not been learnt even to this day. Our report recommended a compromise, and that is why people did not like it. Everybody compared their ideal solution with our compromise, and our compromise looked weak and...

Queen's Speech — Debate (2nd Day) (10 May 2012)

Lord Wakeham: I will be frightfully indiscreet and say that if I were still in charge of business management, I would be 100% in favour of my noble friend's Bill but probably would still not have given it government time to get it through, because I know perfectly well what happens. Every single amendment you can think of would have been added to it, and the timetable of the Government would have been...

Procedure of the House (Proposal 1) — Motion to Resolve (8 November 2011)

Lord Wakeham: My Lords, I declare an interest in these matters. I am a member of the Procedure Committee, a former Leader of this House and the only living person who has been Leader both of this House and of another place-in fact, only the fifth person in British history who has ever held both jobs. I say all that because I think what I am going to say will be pretty disagreeable to a great many people in...

Procedure of the House (Proposal 1) — Motion to Resolve (8 November 2011)

Lord Wakeham: I do not mind.

Procedure of the House (Proposal 1) — Motion to Resolve (8 November 2011)

Lord Wakeham: I have no idea. I am speaking only on proposal 1; that is all I know about. I have had many years' experience of whipping and I consider that, like other things, it is best done in private.

Procedure of the House (Proposal 1) — Motion to Resolve (8 November 2011)

Lord Wakeham: If I may resume, the first point that I was making was that the Leader of the House does not direct the House but it offers advice. The second point is that the proposal before us today deals only with which party or group the Leader thinks should have the next turn; it does not deal with the question of two Peers rising from the same Benches. The third point on this matter, and in my view...

House of Lords: Reform — Motion to Take Note (Continued) (21 June 2011)

Lord Wakeham: My Lords, like many noble Lords in this House, I have had my say on Lords reform many times in the past. It is 10 years since my royal commission reported, and I still think it was probably the best way forward. At the time, the then Government referred to it with approbation in their election manifesto, and slightly embarrassed me by actually using my name in their election manifesto. I...

House of Lords: Reform — Motion to Take Note (Continued) (21 June 2011)

Lord Wakeham: I would say two things to the noble Lord. First, I am not absolutely sure that he is completely right about that. If I recall rightly, for example, in Australia there have been moments of considerable difficulty between the two Houses. Secondly, at the time of the royal commission, if I remember rightly we looked into a number of different systems in different parts of the world and concluded...