House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) (Abolition of By-Elections) Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town and Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 23rd November 2018 Grand Committee

[Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood (CB)]

My Lords, I will briefly address just two of the points that the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, made objecting to the Bill. The first objection is on the basis that the Bill would end the one part of the existing process for the creation of new Members that is democratic because it depends on election rather than appointment. I can perfectly well understand, though I profoundly disagree with, those who argue for an elected House rather than an appointed House. What I fail utterly to understand is why it should be considered less objectionable—indeed, considered a partial answer to those opposed to an appointed House—that 92 of its Members and those who currently elect their successors come from a privileged class of hereditary Peers who, alone, are candidates for election. This is what the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, and, indeed, I in the past, have called the “assisted places scheme”. It is nonsense. It is hardly going to persuade those in favour of democracy that: “Ah, we meet that test now; we wouldn’t if this Bill went through”.

The second point is in relation to Amendment 58B: the suggestion that we wait until we are down to 600 before we implement the Bill. Under the Burns proposals, which are the route by which we hope to reduce the House to 600, those who leave by death or retirement are to be replaced—initially one for two, later one for one—by new members of the same party, so if hereditary elections remain, Tory slots in future would sometimes inevitably have to be filled by hereditaries wherever there is a gap. That would reduce the number of new Members whom the party leader might otherwise prefer to be in the House. If this Bill passes, therefore, and the Burns scheme succeeds in reducing us to 600, the Tories will not lose in numbers but will gain in the choice of who fills the available slots. If the Bill fails, hereditaries will form an ever-larger part of the Tory group. Is that really what they want?

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)]

There is only one point I want to raise, other than to say that of course we want a general election. Actually there are two issues. One, which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown, has just mentioned, is the importance of refreshing this House not only with those who happen to be sons of people who, as the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, said, were appointed by a monarch or a Prime Minister. It will be important to refresh the House so that it is not just men who are appointed. That will certainly be the case for the Conservative Party which, otherwise, will end up very male-dominated.

My other point, from the point of view of the Labour Party, is on an issue that has been raised and which I have responded to before about the binding commitment. The binding commitment was, of course, not binding in law; it was binding until it was possible to change the composition of the House. I remind the noble Lord that that commitment was made in 1997. After we lost office, his party were in government in coalition from 2010 to 2015 and did not manage to bring in a change to the House, they were then not in coalition and did not do it, and they are now effectively in coalition again and are not doing it. The lack of commitment to changing the House means that a commitment made much earlier no longer has the standing that it had at the time.