House of Lords: Reform

Debate between Baroness Hooper and Baroness Boothroyd

Wednesday 22nd June 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hooper]

My Lords, having been a Member of your Lordships' House for 26 years, I have had almost equal experience of the House when it consisted of mixed hereditary and life Peers as of the current composition of appointed life Peers with a small and select band of elected hereditaries. As far as I am concerned, the post-1999 House of Lords is no better, no more democratic and no more able to defeat the Government or ask the House of Commons to think again and does not have a greater breadth of expertise. It is certainly less independent, more partisan and more expensive. I therefore again wish to put on record my regret that the historic and traditional element of our ancient Parliament, which was represented by hereditary Peers, should have been lost apart from the small group who remain and continue to do sterling work. The brilliant speech by my noble friend Lord Elton earlier is a witness to that.

I welcome the proposals before us to the extent that they at least show that the Government are prepared to follow through on the so-called reform Act of 1999. For those of us who were here in 1997 and 1998 when the then Government spoke of their mandate from the public and how urgent and important their proposals were, there was an assumption that the Bill was but the first stage of reform and the dawn of a new era. In fact, all it amounted to was a Bill to abolish the right of hereditary Peers to sit in the House of Lords or, as the then Leader put it, to get rid of hereditary Peers.

I am a natural conservative, in that I do not like change for the sake of change. If changes have to be made, it has to be shown that they are changes for the better. The 1999 reform Act did not achieve that; a wholly appointed House is not an improvement, although I can understand that those who have become Members since 1999 are able to persuade themselves that it is now a much improved place. If I had a magic wand, I would use it to return to the pre-1999 position, and I only wish that the noble Baroness, Lady Boothroyd, had been here in 1998, as I feel sure that she would have been a doughty champion of the status quo then as she is now. I join others in congratulating her—

[Baroness Boothroyd]

I am most grateful to the noble Baroness, but I am not in favour of the status quo. I am in favour of reform, but it must be incremental reform, as laid out in the Bill proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Steel. I want reform, but I want sound and good reform when it does come.

[Baroness Hooper]

I thank the noble Baroness for her intervention. I was about to congratulate her on the style and bravura of her speech yesterday. I must say that, if she supports the Steel Bill, in my opinion that is a long way in the direction of preserving the status quo. However, we are where we are—facing the current proposals.

There are so many ways in which the working of the House of Lords could be improved, and there have been many excellent and some very novel suggestions in the course of this debate. Like others, I have always believed that in considering further reforms we should be looking at the whole of Parliament—that is, at both Houses, also taking into account the powers and functions of the devolved Parliaments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, which considerably change the constitutional map.

I have also always believed that we should move towards a fully elected second Chamber, since I do not consider that the present wholly appointed House has democratic legitimacy. However, my idea of a fully elected second Chamber would be via the medium of indirect elections, based on a system of electoral colleges to ensure that the breadth of expertise, which most people agree already exists and must remain if the role of the second Chamber is to be mainly that of scrutinising and revising legislation, should be guaranteed. The electoral college system would allow doctors, lawyers, academics, the voluntary sector, the regions and other groups to be defined to elect their representatives for a period of time. It would be on much the same lines as the hereditary Peers do today so, far from wanting the hereditary Peers to wither away, as has been suggested would be the result of the Steel Bill, I want them to remain and to be reinforced because of the historic continuity that their presence gives to this House.

I cannot therefore find anything to recommend in the Government’s proposals for direct elections or the system that they suggest. Perhaps the only thing I can agree with in these proposals is the decision not to change the name of the House of Lords, at least not in the short term. It would indeed be ridiculous to have a House of Commons without a House of Lords. It is perfectly feasible to have Members of the House of Lords without having to create them all as Peers of the realm, which has indeed become something of a charade. Yet the idea of a senate has no appeal at all.

I started out by trying to find something to welcome in these government proposals. The more that I have listened to the debate and its many brilliant and constructive speeches, the more I recognise that they simply will not do. I hope that the Government will do the same and draw the same conclusion.