Afghanistan

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Wednesday 18th August 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I declare my interests as a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

I want to start with our moral duty as a country to the locally employed staff—interpreters, embassy staff and others—and their families. The noble Lord, Lord Dannatt, made the point of principle about extracting them from Afghanistan as soon as possible. I also echo my noble friend Lord Purvis’s comments on the Afghanistan resettlement plan. However, I see from the ARAP notice last month that these key people are to be given only five years’ leave to remain. That is completely unacceptable. There is no likely return for years, if ever, so resettlement should be made permanent from the start.

I also understand from the Local Government Association that around 2,000 have already arrived in recent weeks. Does this mean that the UK is taking only 3,000 more this calendar year? It is apparent that these numbers are woefully inadequate. Does the Minister agree that the Government must increase them in light of the current emergency?

For those who do arrive, there are many practical problems, so the principles of the military covenant should be provided for those in the ARAP scheme, many of whom will have lived through the same as, and worse than, our wonderful service men and women. I am hearing that GPs in some of the receiving areas are already full and not taking new patients. Access to urgent health services, especially mental health services, is vital for new arrivals.

While the Home Office is paying for hotel accommodation for quarantine and beyond until permanent housing can be found, can the Minister say what financial support will be given to local authorities, which are being asked at very short notice to find permanent housing for families when there is already a national shortage? Many local authorities are accepting their responsibilities and stepping up to help, but the cuts that local government has faced in recent years, as well as pandemic pressures, mean that resources to help these families, which are vital if they are to settle swiftly, will be difficult to find. One council leader told me of problems in their area in finding any school places, because all their schools are already full. It is vital that these children start school with everyone else. Using the principles of the military covenant means that local solutions absolutely must be found, and children deserve that support.

Finally, I completely agree with my leader, my noble friend Lord Newby, about the effect of this debacle on service personnel who were deployed in Afghanistan, especially those injured and those who lost loved ones, and their family and friends. Having talked in the last few days to UK service personnel who were deployed to Afghanistan, I am hearing that many, whether still serving or veterans, are having difficult memories reawakened and worse. Some are having flashbacks and their PTSD is triggered. The MoD is ensuring that current service men and women are being signposted to help, but can the Minister say whether there is specific signposting for veterans no longer in the services so that they can get any urgent help that they need?

Procedure and Privileges

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Tuesday 13th July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

My Lords, for the last year your Lordships’ House has moved forward in its processes and has even joined the 21st century by using Zoom, Teams and electronic voting, in the Chamber and remotely. The decision to move to hybrid working was necessary and it is important to say a big “thank you” to all those who have made it possible. So I echo the thanks of the previous speakers, but I want to mention the commission, the clerks, all the Whips’ offices and the myriad invisible staff who have come to our aid to make it work. I especially thank the broadcasting teams, who onboard us with patience and courtesy, and help problem-solve when things do not quite work. Above all, I thank everybody who has made this work across the House.

We have to learn the lessons of what worked well for us and what we can change to improve our future ways of working, and this report proposes some of those. I think that retaining the extended time for Questions, and, indeed, speakers’ lists, are sensible. For those such as the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, who want us to return to bobbing, I say that there are some who always find it difficult to get in over noisy colleagues, and for those of us who cannot stand there is immense frustration that we are invisible to the rest of your Lordships at Question Time and too often spoken over. The proposals of the noble Lords, Lord Cormack and Lord Balfe, do not quite address the problem that we wheelchair users face.

On voting, keeping the principle of electronic voting is good, but forcing Members on to the main Parliamentary Estate to use it seems somewhat short-sighted. As a disabled Peer, I know that the most suitable offices for wheelchairs are in Millbank, but it is not possible to reliably get out of the building, across the road and into Parliament in time to vote. The reality is that people just do not see wheelchairs. They do not give way in lifts; cars do not give way on crossings; and at bottlenecks coming into Parliament, wheelchairs always seem to be pushed to the back. That means we have to stay in the main building, often in offices unsuitable for wheelchair users. Having these stands to tap in would be very helpful.

My main focus today is to thank the commission, its sub-committee and especially the Lord Speaker for listening to the disabled Members of your Lordships’ House. To say we were distressed by some of the comments from the Benches opposite during the previous debate in May is an understatement. We felt devalued and excluded by other noble Lords, to be told that if we could not physically come in, we did not deserve our place in your Lordships’ House. Some Members opposite even suggested that we should retire because we were “frail and elderly”. We are not; we are disabled, and, under the law of this land, all organisations are required to make reasonable adjustments for disabled people to help them overcome the barriers they face. These proposals are a start and, I believe, a trailblazer for disabled parliamentarians in Westminster. I hope that the commission will keep the practical working of these proposals under review. As an opposition Front-Bencher, I am not quite sure how some of these proposals will work in the heat of debate on a Bill, but I believe that the House authorities are prepared to help Members like me give it a go.

I would like to restate something I said in the previous debate: I am desperate to return to the Chamber, and I will as soon as it is safe for me to do so. But, as I mentioned in that debate, there are some other Members of your Lordships’ House who are excluded from these proposals but who cannot come to Parliament for the foreseeable future. I refer to the clinically extremely vulnerable, who were told yesterday by the Government in revised formal guidance that, from next Monday, because all other restrictions will be lifted and because of the large surge in Covid cases, they must keep themselves safe and not meet people inside, not come into contact with unvaccinated people, and ensure that they keep socially distant from others, whether inside or outside. I believe that this makes it impossible for them to resume their seats in the physical Chamber. Some of these clinically extremely vulnerable people are disabled, but not long-term. Others may not define themselves as disabled, and they are not the “frail elderly” referred to by noble Lords opposite in our previous debate. But, under these arrangements, they are to be excluded from your Lordships’ House, despite Ministers and these people’s hospital consultants saying that they should not come to London and to Parliament because it is not safe for them. I do hope that the commission will reconsider this small group of people.

Finally, can the Leader of the House say what will happen if further restrictions need to be imposed in the future? Can hybrid facilities be reinstated if necessary? I hope, with every single other Member of this House, that it will absolutely not be necessary—but, as Israel and the Netherlands have recently discovered, the virus and its variants may have further shocks for us all.

House of Lords: Remote Participation and Hybrid Sittings

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Thursday 20th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I echo the thanks to all the staff who managed to adapt our proceedings, especially the technical team and clerks for making the actual proceedings run so smoothly, and all beyond that who have had to change the way they work over these last 15 months. I thank them, and the commission for doing its best to respond to the unprecedented circumstances of Covid-19 and the need to find alternative ways of working, and to change those as circumstances in the country changed too.

The Constitution Committee’s very helpful report and the contribution from my leader and noble friend Lord Newby set out the difficulties of the hybrid system, with which I agree, and possible routes back that do not set hard dates, way ahead of our knowledge of the spread of coronavirus. I also echo the comments of many speakers that a way of electronic voting in the future, even if on the parliamentary estate, seems sensible. We waste hours of our time in Divisions, queuing in the Lobbies.

The noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, spoke of Parliament being to “parley”, to come together. He is half-right. The word “parliament” comes from the Old French verb “parler”, in its indicative form: “parlement”, or speaking. I assert that the one achievement of the last year is that we have all been speaking, but using the technology of the 21st century. All the other details of how we work, spoken of by many so far, especially the Constitution Committee, have suffered. Despite what I will say next, I welcome the return, in due course, of the entire business of the House being physically in the Chamber. Stronger than that, I long to be there and part of it.

I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Seccombe, that we have achieved real progress with Bills during this year. Things may not have been perfect, but the contributions, scrutiny and challenge during the Domestic Abuse Bill have shown that it can work. It is not perfect, but it can work.

The noble Earl, Lord Howe, talked about “a temporary solution to a temporary problem”, but are the Government, as well as the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, and his supporters, confident that that temporary problem is at an end? The Prime Minister, Ministers and SAGE do not yet agree. We have all been told to expect more different variants that will get round large numbers of people having been vaccinated. The World Health Organization and Ministers say that we are not safe until everyone is safe and we are reaping the lessons, at the moment, of moving India to the red list too late. Although there are hopes that it will not affect those already vaccinated, it is certainly infecting younger people. With the higher level of transmissibility, cases are increasing in more than 100 different areas. We have been warned to expect more variants to do this in the next few months.

I declare my interest in this matter. I am one of those irritating people who are classified as clinically extremely vulnerable; there are a number in your Lordships’ House. That is not because I am sick at the moment, but because of the immunosuppressant drugs that I need to take to manage the autoimmune disease that has left me disabled. On 1 May this year, the Government reiterated their advice to the clinically vulnerable: always socially distance; remove yourself from any environment where social distancing is breached by others; work from home, if at all possible and, if not, ensure that your employer makes your workplace safe for you. I am not one of those lucky grandparents who have been able to hug their grandchildren or children, for 15 months now.

We do not yet know how quickly Covid antibodies will dissipate after two vaccinations other than for the clinically vulnerable, for whom they believe that protection will not be reliable. Yesterday, the Government invested £90 million in booster vaccine research, ready to go again with more doses in the autumn, hence the advice of caution, caution, caution. This is a warning word, as caution must be everything to all of us, not just those who think they are covered because they have had two doses of the vaccine.

The noble Lord, Lord Cormack, spoke of remote working as a “comfortable way forward”. It is not comfortable for those of us who are ordered not to be with noble Lords. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman: I too am unashamedly sentimentalist about Parliament and want us to return to as much in-person contribution as possible. I am not alone in being desperate to rejoin a physical Lordships’ House, but I cannot.

The noble Baroness, Lady Campbell of Surbiton, made an important point about the duties of an organisation in regard to disability discrimination, which I am sure that the commission and House authorities have heard, even if the noble Lord, Lord Farmer, dismisses us for being of unsound body or mind and, therefore, not worthy of a place in your Lordships’ House. I am grateful to those who seek to enable some way for us to contribute. Without it, the words of the Queen at the introduction of a Peer become somewhat meaningless.

Covid-19 Update

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Thursday 13th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

As I set out in my response to the noble Baroness, there are a number of factors in why we believe that spring 2022 is the right time to start this inquiry. I gave them earlier. Of course the noble Lord is absolutely right that we need to tackle the worrying backlog of people needing care from the NHS, which is why we have committed billions of pounds to doing so, including £1 billion to tackle waiting lists by providing up to 1 million extra checks, scans and additional operations. We will continue to prioritise urgent and cancer care, as well as the recovery of non-urgent diagnostics and treatment so that patients receive the best healthcare as quickly as possible. That is an absolute priority.

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

The noble Baroness the Leader of the House did not respond to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Newby, about the publication of interim reports from reviews and inquiries. The Hackitt review on the Grenfell fire and the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse also produced interim reports in order to save lives and protect people. The Leader of the House has admitted that we know that the pandemic is by no means over. Surely an inquiry into the pandemic should also publish interim lessons learned to save lives and protect people. Can she make sure that that happens?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

I am sure that, when a chair takes their place, views like that will certainly be put to them and it will be up to them to decide.

Covid-19: Road Map

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd February 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord McNicol of West Kilbride) (Lab)]

I apologise for missing the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, whom I now call.

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I return to my noble friend Lord Newby’s question about self-isolation. Australia and New Zealand give a straight- forward grant, set at minimum wage, for those self-isolating and quarantining, with no means testing. Their results have been outstanding, with a very high compliance level; people do not have to choose between putting food on their tables and isolating. Given our low levels of compliance, should not the Government move to a non-means-tested grant, as a tool to succeed in lifting lockdown, as a matter of urgency?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

As I said, the £500 support payment has been extended, so parents of children who are isolating are now eligible for it. In addition to that, we are increasing, to £20 million a month, the funding available to local authorities to make discretionary payments, and that money is intended to support those who fall outside the scope of the main payment but still face hardship. As I have said, obviously we have the Budget next week, where there will be further detail in the round about the economic support we will provide going forward.

Covid-19 Update

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Thursday 7th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

Yes, I can give the noble Lord that assurance. Work is already ongoing, but he is absolutely right: it is critical.

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

My Lords, this morning, the Health Service Journal has said that our already overburdened hospitals are trying to release Covid patients into care homes but that a major problem is stopping this. The National Care Forum reports that insurance for designated Covid settings is now almost impossible to get and that, without indemnity cover, they cannot take Covid patients. NHS Providers is begging the Treasury to help, as hospital beds must be freed up, but the Treasury is refusing. Can the Lord Privy Seal take this up with the Treasury as a matter of extreme urgency and help resolve this problem, not of care homes’ making, which is blocking beds in hospitals at a time of national crisis? Please will she keep me informed of progress?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

I am very happy to raise those issues with both the Department of Health and the Treasury. I am sure that my noble friend Lord Bethell in particular will be able to keep the noble Baroness updated on discussions.

Palace of Westminster: Restoration and Renewal

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Tuesday 6th February 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, in the wonderful elegance of parliamentary language, we have talked much already about “patch and mend”. The restoration and renewal of the buildings and the facilities in the Palace of Westminster are vital and urgent and I believe that we need to use much franker language given the neglect of the past. I support the Motion and oppose the amendment. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, that 20 years ago I was bursar of Selwyn College, Cambridge, when we needed to renew and restore our main court that had seen little—frankly, virtually no—maintenance and progress since it was built a century before. Student rooms still had gas and electric fires and the electric cabling was on its last legs, with much of the urgent work not visible or easily accessible. Does this sound familiar?

Since Selwyn was the poorest college and had very little resource to invest over the years in the buildings, the “patch and mend” approach was clearly failing us. We knew we had to do the work in one go, no matter how disruptive it was. We were also clear that we had to ensure it did not happen again, and that maintenance must be built into the future life of the buildings. This is also true for the Palace of Westminster after this major work. What steps are being taken to ensure that detailed maintenance costs of the building, and not just the ordinary life of the building, are being built into the baseline budget and then ring-fenced? The future of this historic and important building is just too important to get wrong.

When my noble friend Lady Thomas of Winchester, who cannot be in her place today but I hope will soon be able to rejoin us, gave evidence to the Joint Committee on the Palace of Westminster, she spoke for many of us who face accessibility issues in the Palace. I am grateful that the Joint Committee has taken the evidence on accessibility from a number of people, but I seek reassurance that there really will be a step change under the full decant option. It is not a “nice to have” option, and now is the best time to do the core work. So I am pleased to see in paragraph 7 of the Motion that there will be,

“full access for people with disabilities”.

That is better than the phrases used in the Deloitte’s pictogram on page 6 of its report, in which two of the bubbles refer to, “works carried out to improve access for all” and “all new lifts to provide improved access to the majority of the Palace of Westminster”. There is a lot of scope for moving around in the middle of that.

The clerks to Parliament and the Director of Facilities, Mr Woodall, as well as ParliAble are unfailingly helpful whenever issues occur. However, most of the problems are about a failure of building and a wider, unconscious cultural attitude that can make the Palace of Westminster extremely unwelcoming to disabled parliamentarians, staff and visitors.

Core to the current problems is the way in which parliamentarians in wheelchairs do not have the same rights and experience as our able-bodied colleagues. A parliamentarian in a wheelchair cannot sit with their party or group in either the Commons or the Lords. Our Lords’ mobility Bench behind the clerks in front of the Cross Benches, has three spaces, so when five or six of us want to speak we cannot stay in our place for the rest of the debate. Worse, if the Chamber is full, we cannot even manoeuvre around after speaking to let another colleague move in. Even worse, the Commons does not even have a mobility Bench.

The design of the space in your Lordships’ House means that people sitting on the Front Bench have to get up and move aside for us to leave or come into the Chamber. Too often, they are reluctant to move. I am afraid that on one occasion, one Peer not only refused to move but insisted that I ask the Opposition Front Bench to move. I could not do so because two Peers were moving amendments from that Front Bench. As a result, I had to wait 20 minutes before I could leave the Chamber and was consequently late for my next meeting.

Wheelchair users often have to travel double the distance as most routes round the Palace have steps. To get to the River Restaurant from Peers’ Entrance one has to go along a corridor, up in a lift, travel back down, past Central Lobby to the Commons, go down in a lift and then all the way back to the Lords. No wonder our batteries do not last long. Wheelchair users have missed votes when travelling from far-flung places in the Palace, especially when both Houses are dividing at the same time because there are so few lifts accessible—that is, large enough—for wheelchair users. Members understandably follow the “take priority for a Division” rule, but they forget that we are Members too, and do not even have the option of the occasional staircase.

It is not possible to get to parts of the Commons ministerial corridors in a wheelchair. The lift behind the Speaker’s Chair in the Commons has a stone arch in front of it that is just too narrow for a standard-size wheelchair, so to access a meeting with a Minister on that corridor, one has to use the stairs. The same is true of the stone archway in Central Lobby leading to the Justice Ministers corridor. Can the Leader of the House confirm that every archway and lift will be fully accessible to those in wheelchairs? I know that some of this is rhetorical, but I am making the point that we say, “accessible to all”. There are no self-opening or closing doors, meaning that at the beginning of the day, disabled people have to face heavy, closed doors which are a real barrier.

The brilliant Changing Places toilet just off Central Lobby is, sadly, one of a kind. Other disabled toilets are too small, cluttered with bins, and the red alarm cords are often in the wrong place and tied up, which makes their use impossible. Will they be upgraded to meet current public building standards? There are a number of ramps in the building already, but they are too steep for wheelchairs—oh, the irony of seeing a ramp painted with a “No Wheelchair” sign. I hope that that will no longer be a problem.

Finally, there is only one space in the whole of the Commons Public Gallery for a wheelchair. There are no wheelchair spaces available for Peers and, unlike in the Lords, it is not permitted for a wheelchair Peer to sit below Bar in the Commons. The final irony is that of MPs standing below Bar in the Lords, preventing a wheelchair user seeing what is going on in her own Chamber. It does not help the feeling that disabled Members just are not welcome.

I therefore look forward to “more accessible for all”, but it is a dangerous starting point. If the newly-restored Palace is not truly accessible for people with disabilities and special needs, it will have failed.

Care: Costs Cap

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Monday 14th September 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)]

My Lords,—

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords—

[The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Stowell of Beeston)]

My Lords, we have not heard from the Liberal Democrats. It is their turn.

[Baroness Brinton]

My Lords, as questioners have illustrated to your Lordships’ House, we face a perfect storm with health and social care. There was cross-party agreement in advance of the 2010 election that the cap was vital. We have delayed discharges and local authorities facing a real crisis. Will the Government take action in the next few weeks to remedy this problem, of which the cap is an important part?

[Baroness Chisholm of Owlpen]

As I said, means-tested financial support remains available for those who cannot afford to pay for care to meet their eligible needs, but the introduction of the cap on care costs system will be the biggest reform to how care is paid for since 1948 and we must ensure that the new system works from day one. Local authorities and partners have consistently warned us of the risks of implementing this too quickly. We will therefore not be complacent and will work hard to make sure that there is additional time to ensure that everyone is ready to introduce the new system and that people can understand what it will mean for them.

Care Sector: Apprenticeships

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Monday 6th July 2015 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Courtown]

My Lords, the noble Baroness asked a number of questions. She asked about a career pathway for young people going into the sector. If we look at the apprenticeship starts by sector, and particularly at the Trailblazer system of industry-designed apprenticeships for getting people into them, there is one for nursing, another for adult care, another for healthcare and another for early years. There have also been in excess of 250,000 new apprenticeship starts in the care sector between 2010-11 and 2013-14. Apprenticeships are one route for those who want to progress into a satisfying career within the care sector.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, the Christie report points out that 20% of nursing students drop out of their university courses, which is a waste of their careers and of public money. Can the Minister say what the Government are planning to do to reduce this dropout rate as a matter of urgency? To have a shortage is not good enough, but to waste 20% of those who enrol in university courses is a disgrace.

[The Earl of Courtown]

The noble Baroness is quite right about people leaving these courses after they have been accepted on them. Ministers in various departments are discussing this issue.

House of Lords: Reform

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd June 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton]

My Lords, yesterday my noble friend Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon made arguments for legitimacy through democratic elections. I believe his arguments are unanswerable and I wish to echo the sentiment. A noble Lord commented afterwards that all Liberal Democrat candidates would write down his speech and deliver it in hustings over the next few years. There have also been comments that nobody outside this House is interested in possible reform.

When the coalition document was published last year, I had not just telephone calls but an irate voter in Watford, where I had stood for Parliament, knocking on the door to say that the coalition document was not strong enough on reform of the House of Lords. I hasten to point out that this was not a Liberal Democrat member but a member of the public who had heard me espousing the reasons that this Chamber should become fully elected at various hustings; it also came up during questions at those hustings. For some people—more than we suspect, I think—reform is an important issue.

I wish to make clear that my personal view is that I support 100 per cent elected, and I agree with the sentiments expressed earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Stamford. However, I am more of a pragmatist than him and suspect that the draft Bill’s proposal of 80 per cent will move us in the right direction while retaining the expertise of the Cross-Benchers. I will come back to that in a minute.

The noble Lord, Lord Davies of Stamford, also referred to the issue of constituencies. It is important to recognise that with any list system on a regional basis, the constituency work of MEPs is very different from the constituency work of MPs in the other place. It is simply the nature of the geography: if you are a Member for a large region you will not have the close contact that you do with constituents in a smaller constituency.

[Lord Davies of Stamford]

Does the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, agree that the difference is that MEPs are elected to handle issues falling under the jurisdiction of the EU? In the case of the Lords and the Commons—or in the future, elected Lords and the Commons—the jurisdiction will be the same, and the issues will be the same. Therefore, there would be the conflict which I drew attention to.

[Baroness Brinton]

The point I am trying to make is that it is not purely about jurisdiction, it is about the practical application of having a constituency of 5 million people as opposed to 75,000.

I turn now to issues of diversity in a future House that is either partially or wholly elected. In an elected House, we need to ensure that recommendations from the Speaker’s Conference to improve the diversity of the other place are taken into account by the scrutiny committee over the next two years. In our present format we do not represent the country in all its diversity. Some of the appointments in recent years have attempted to deal with that, but, partly because there is no retirement, we still do not reflect the country that we represent.

There is also an issue about the geographical diversity that is needed. If we looked at where most Peers come from, I suspect that we would find a heavy southern bias. I was speaking with colleagues in the north-east the other day who feel that they do not have access to many Peers; they have some, but not the same as those who live among the large concentration in London and the south-east.

As for the conventions governing the relationship between the two Houses, we all agree that those are not absolute. I do not take the view that they will stand still, and my noble friend the Leader of the House must have been right yesterday when he said that the conventions will evolve and that the relationships between the two Houses may change. However, that is nothing new. Conventions have evolved over the years and the relationship between the Houses changes with time.

This House is much more muscular than it was a few decades ago. For example, in the decade up to 2000 the Government were defeated 155 times; in the decade up to 2010 the Government were defeated 422 times—nearly a threefold increase. Granted, cause and effect cannot be proved. It may be that the change in government in 1997 was influential and the reforms which saw the departure of the majority of the hereditary Peers should be noted.

However, we have not seen this House attempting to depart from any of the conventions since then. Furthermore, Clause 2(3) of the draft Bill makes it clear that the conventions governing the relationship between the two Houses are to remain unaffected, and there is no reason to suppose that that aim will not be achieved. However, if a future Parliament were of the view that the conventions needed to be explicitly codified to protect their efficacy, legislation could be brought forward to bring that about, as was proposed in the 2005 Labour manifesto.

I am concerned that a House of 300 could deal adequately with the workload of the House, particularly if there were to remain some who are not full-time politicians. I suspect that many in this House, and the public at large, regard the presence of some who are not full-time as one of the strengths of this House. The pride that is rightly taken in the House’s expertise derives largely from having here many who are active in other spheres, and I am not sure that it is intended that we should sit on many more days than we currently do.

Pride in the expertise of the Members of this House does not derive solely from the presence of Cross-Benchers, much as I respect their expertise. It is unfair to assert as a generality—and I have heard it said—that those who are unelected or without party affiliation hold a monopoly on expertise. A glance around this Chamber certainly proves that wrong.

As for the system of election, as a committed supporter of STV for parliamentary elections I nevertheless feel that—in the larger constituencies that will be appropriate for proportional elections to this House of, say, 80 to 120 new Members across the country at each election—an open list system has much to commend it. In particular, we would be far more likely to achieve a membership that is more diverse, as I mentioned earlier, and more representative of Britain as a whole with an open list system than we might with STV. That is why we should consider that system for elections. However, whatever the system of election, a democratically legitimate upper House, as part of a democratic Parliament of the United Kingdom, is a goal that we should pursue and achieve.