House of Lords: Reform

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 9:17 pm on 13 March 2007.

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Photo of Lord Kingsland Lord Kingsland Shadow Lord Chancellor, Constitutional Affairs, Shadow Lord Chancellor, Parliament 9:17, 13 March 2007

My Lords, I had a short conversation with a colleague of mine on the Front Bench the other day. I explained to him that the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, had asked me to wind up this debate after hearing 130 speakers. I asked my noble friend what I should tell him. He said, "Tell him you've got flu". I did not have the courage.

We have heard an astonishingly large number of fine speeches in the course of this debate. I cannot think of a single speech that has not demonstrated at least a degree of perspicacity. Many have stimulated the intellect, and some have stirred the emotions. I am thinking particularly of the speeches of the noble Baroness, Lady Boothroyd, and my noble friend Lady Miller of Hendon.

I should say right from the start that, unlike the Liberal Democrats, the Opposition are having a free vote. I have said enough.

I shall try to refer to as many of your Lordships who have intervened as possible but, for reasons which I hope noble Lords will agree are entirely understandable, I will not be able to refer to everyone. A number of speakers wondered whether another place really understood the implications of what they voted for on the grounds that no rational political organisation would vote for a diminution of its powers. I remember particularly the noble Lord, Lord Lea of Crondall, making that point in a very vivid manner. I have read the debate in another place. I thought that quite a large number of Members were very clear about the consequences of a vote for a fully elected or a mainly elected House. Not all of them wanted those consequences, but my impression was that they, by and large, knew exactly what they were doing.

Whether I am right or wrong, it is plain that it is impossible to divorce composition from powers. The greatest flaw in the Government's White Paper is its attempt to do that. The White Paper says that the powers that your Lordships have are the powers that we ought to have, but that, in addition, we ought to be elected.

There is no doubt that if we become an elected House this will have profound implications for the powers that we exercise, even if one assumes that the powers that we have now will remain. That point was made very well by the Joint Committee on Conventions at paragraph 61, which states:

"Our conclusions apply only to present circumstances. If the Lords acquired an electoral mandate, then in our view their role as the revising chamber, and their relationship with the Commons, would inevitably be called into question, codified or not".

My noble friend Lord Saatchi referred to the Parliament Act 1911. My advice to my noble friend on the question of implied repeal was somewhat more nuanced than my noble friend suggested, although I yield to no one in my respect for his fertile imagination. But perhaps it is worth just looking—at the risk of imposing a degree of tedium on your Lordships—at the preamble to the Parliament Act 1911, which states:

"Whereas it is expedient that provision should be made for regulating the relations between the two Houses of Parliament:

And whereas it is intended to substitute for the House of Lords as it at present exists a Second Chamber constituted on a popular instead of hereditary basis, but such substitution cannot be immediately brought into operation:

And whereas provision will require hereafter to be made by Parliament in a measure effecting such substitution for limiting and defining the powers of the new Second Chamber, but it is expedient to make such provision as in this Act appears for restricting the existing powers of the House of Lords'.

The legislative intention at that time is clear. First, it had—because it could not at that time create a popular House—to do something about the political situation it faced. Hence, the Parliament Act, which was an Act of expediency. It is absolutely clear from this preamble that if and when your Lordships' House became a democratically elected House, the relationship between the two Houses would have to be reviewed. That is clear. So, given the fact that composition and powers are intimately linked, if we were to be popularly elected, what will the new constitutional settlement be between another place and your Lordships' House? That is ineluctably the crucial question we have to face; and until we have an answer to it, I really do not see, either in logic or in politics, how we can take the matter much further.

My noble friend Lord St John of Fawsley quoted Bagehot, a writer with whom he owned up to having at least a passing acquaintanceship. My noble friend said that Bagehot recommended that constitutional change should be conducted carefully, slowly and by agreement. How I wish, as the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, said, that the Government had heeded that advice on previous occasions; a failure no better illustrated than with respect to House of Lords reform. To adopt an apt image conjured up by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Irvine of Lairg, the Government have embarked on a long and hazard-infested voyage, but have neglected to take with them the appropriate navigational equipment.

We understand from the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor that, before any move is made towards reform of the system of selection for your Lordships' House, there must be consensus. By that I understand that it is to be consensus not only between the political parties, but also between the Houses. The noble and learned Lord has proposed, and my noble friend Lord Strathclyde has welcomed, that the cross-party talks that have been taking place over the past few months be reconvened in the light of the debates in both Houses in order to consider what moves ought to be made next. The noble Baroness, Lady Symons, and my noble friend Lord Higgins both, rightly, pointed out that there was a degree of controversy in both Houses about the appropriate route to take and that therefore either the views of a selection of Back-Benchers should be represented at these cross-party talks or committees of both Houses should be established to advance discussions because, since we are on a free vote, clearly what each individual Peer believes is crucial to the achievement of consensus.

I want to ask the noble and learned Lord, when he replies, if he would kindly address this matter. I am not at all clear how he sees these cross-party talks developing. Quite apart from the question of the membership of this forum, what result does the noble and learned Lord expect to emerge? Does he expect, for example, to produce a new White Paper in the light of these discussions and in the light of the deliberations of the cross-party committee? I think that the noble and learned Lord has got the point and I am most grateful.

The noble Lord, Lord Williamson, rightly emphasised that the vote which took place in the other place was an indicative vote. He went on to say that we cannot predict what view Members of another place will take about the whole question of election until they are presented with a specific proposal. He said that answers to detailed questions were an essential precondition of any discussions about the merits of an elected House.

The details are extremely challenging for your Lordships' House and another place. Many of your Lordships spoke in much detail and with much wisdom about systems of election. In the time that I have, I cannot possibly reflect all the sophistication of the lines of argument; so I shall select a few points which I think are most germane to the question of an elected House.

It is widely accepted that any electoral system that produces a low turnout will be wholly counterproductive. That point was made particularly well by the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, but by others too. Here is a real difficulty: an election to your Lordships' House is not like an election to another place. We are not going to present the electorate with a mandate for power. When there is a general election, the parties compete, there is a competition of mandates and everybody understands that if the party they vote for wins, that mandate will be at the heart of government. In your Lordships' House, we will be asking people to vote for a House which has the power to delay legislation for one year at the most. That is not a very inspiring message to deliver to the electorate.

We have some practical experience of this, as it is one of the problems that the European Parliament has had. It does not have a mandate; the political mandate in the Community is developed by the Commission under the control of the Council of Ministers. The European Parliament is simply there to democratise the process to the extent that it can. That is also not a very inspiring message to take to the electorate. If we are to have an electoral system, it has to inspire.

I think that all your Lordships will also agree that the electoral system we choose must not be a clone of the electoral system in another place. If we simply reproduce what is in another place, we will provide no control over the Executive.

A more controversial question was whether the elected Members should also be accountable to the electorate. My noble friend Lady Shephard made this point particularly powerfully in attacking the notion that elections should be for one term of 15 years only. She is absolutely right that that system does not produce accountability. I think I am right in saying that the idea of the 15-year single mandate came from a committee chaired by my noble and learned friend Lord Mackay of Clashfern. Its purpose was to engage the public in selection to the Lords without undermining the independence of the elected Peer. My noble friend Lord Wakeham put it very well when he described it as a system of appointment but by the people, not by the Appointments Commission. In a characteristically deft aphorism, the noble Viscount, Lord Bledisloe, said that that meant that as a Member, one had nothing to hope and nothing to fear. Although I accept that accountability is absent, this system, in my submission, gets closest to providing the kind of independence that your Lordships enjoy at the moment.

The controversies about the method of election will be endless. I shall not enter into them except to say that I was glad to hear the list system widely deplored. It is a disastrous system. Whatever other system we choose, be it first-past-the-post or some form of proportional representation, it must be based on constituencies. When should the election be? My own preference, unlike that of the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, would be for it not to be on the same day as the general election.

We had a very interesting discussion about transitional arrangements, in which my noble friend Lord Ferrers played a prominent part. A number of your Lordships mentioned various dilemmas about cash for peerages, but my noble friend concentrated on the cost of dismissing Peers rather than appointing them. The costs by his calculations were colossal. One might summarise his observations as the cost of "disappeers".