House of Lords Reform

Baroness Freeman of Steventon Excerpts

Tuesday 12th November 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Freeman of Steventon (CB)]

Before I joined your Lordships’ House this year, I had little understanding of its role—like most people in this country, as the noble Lord, Lord Ranger, said. I thought for a moment I was going to be enlightened by the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, but I think I am still slightly in the dark.

To make decisions on reform of this House, we need to think about exactly what the House’s role is and how it can complement the work of MPs in the other place and the civil servants who support government. I have been thinking, as people ask me what we do, about what in the last few months of my time in this House I have seen that we do really well. Where can we provide something that the other place does not? What are its problems and why are they occurring? What can we do to resolve them?

To start with the strengths—and there are some—the ability to go into depth and convene expertise in Select Committees is incredibly impressive. The House goes through legislation in real detail, as others have already said. People speak out about concerns and issues openly, respectfully and constructively in this Chamber. There is also the breadth of expertise and experience that Members of this House bring. When I talk to people and describe how Members range from farmers to pharmacologists, and from filmmakers to financial experts, they are genuinely surprised. We need to talk more about what we do and who we are in this Chamber. They are appreciative of what those different experiences can bring.

Members of the other place are chosen by local communities to represent the country geographically. That is not the purpose of your Lordships’ Chamber. This membership is representative of—or at least seeks to represent in different ways—professional and other life experiences. Of course, I recognise that we are in no way representative of life experience and professions in this country, but we can bring diverse experience. As the noble Lord, Lord Norton, said, at its best this place brings a huge breadth of experience to help ensure that the Government’s legislation achieves its aims, is joined up and does not have unforeseen consequences for some people.

We have Members with very deep experience and long memories, some of which I have been benefiting from this evening, to help us learn from the past. With appointments that can last decades, we can take responsibility for considering long-term risks and planning. We do not seek short-term popularity. I was going to say that there is no incentive to kick the can down the road but, having heard this debate, I fear that there is one subject where we kick the can down the road.

What about problems? Everybody today has talked about the size of the House. I think that is linked to the way in which Members are appointed. It seems that every time a different party comes into government, it feels the need to appoint new Members to your Lordships’ House to achieve a majority. With lifelong membership, the result is obvious.

In order to solve that, while enhancing the benefits of long appointments and breadth of experience and expertise, my suggestion is to remove party politics from this Chamber altogether—to allow every Member to be a Cross-Bencher, and to speak and vote as they feel appropriate having listened to and considered the representations of other Members and the wider public. I realise that getting to speaker number 61 without anybody before me having mentioned this means that I am probably saying the unthinkable.

I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Saatchi. I am very interested in bringing more opinions from outside this House into its workings in a formalised way, learning from things that have been done in countries such as Taiwan. That way, we can truly listen more directly to the voices of the people we serve. If we have a non-party-political House, with only Government Ministers having a formal political position in the Chamber for the duration of their ministerial appointment, this removes the incentive for the continual growth of the House through political necessity.

On appointments to this Chamber, a lot can be learned from the study of the basis of trust—the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, mentioned trust. When you ask people why they do or do not trust a particular person, they regularly talk about a few things: competence, reliability, honesty and motivation. Do they have your best interests at heart, or their own? Those four criteria are not bad ones to use to guide the selection of those who serve in this House. An independent appointments board that keeps an eye on the representativeness of this House’s experience could help to ensure that we have a second Chamber that can fulfil an important and trusted role within our democracy. But we should also formally and properly consult the public on different proposals for the reform of this House, just as we should on all issues that we debate.