House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Committee of the whole House
Tuesday 12th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

I had hoped that the Paymaster General would have given a categorical assurance that there would be further legislation and that in the next King’s Speech a retirement age in the House of Lords will be introduced as part of that legislation, along with a minimum participation level, but he stayed silent. He made a little quip. I will give him another opportunity to do so, although he will probably stay in his place, which is of course his right.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

I do not know where the naive assumption or belief on the Labour Benches that there will be further Lords reform comes from. There will not be any more. I was here during the ’90s when Labour attempted to bring in Lords reform and gave up immediately, with no intention of ever bringing that back. This is it—this is all we are going to get—and unless we make this a good Bill, this is all we will get in this Parliament.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for making an incredibly powerful point. He is absolutely right. He is a veteran of these arguments and knows how it will go because we have seen it before. This is the moment. There is not going to be another one—this is it.

I turn to new clauses 1 and 2, which are the most important of the ones that I have tabled. It is fundamentally unfair that we still have a situation where a bloc of clerics have a right and a say over our legislation—over how my constituents live. I cannot see how in today’s world that can be justified. We have not seen arguments come forward as to why these 26 bishops should be defended.

--- Later in debate ---

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

I rise to speak in support of new clauses 9 to 14, which stand in my name, and all the associated amendments, but I will also support any amendment that would reduce the size of the House of Lords and limit its authority in our legislature, as long as it remains a wholly democratic institution.

I am quite a simple soul. I am just someone who intrinsically believes that if you represent the people, you should be voted for by the people. I believe that if you are to legislate, it requires consent through some sort of electoral mandate from a group of people who vote for you to go into a legislature to represent them and who allow you to make the laws of the land. That is a simple belief and I think it is generally supported by the majority of the British people. Certainly the latest opinion polls on the House of Lords show that only about one in seven people in the UK think that the House of Lords in its current condition is worth supporting. A vast majority want a fully elected House of Lords, and that is what Labour promised. That is what they said they would deliver. That is what they commissioned Gordon Brown to do, and he came back with a report that said he would do it. And, of course, it has not happened.

I am touched by Labour Members’ naive faith that there will be more than this Bill. It is quite touching that they actually believe that a succession of pieces of legislation is going to come through that will incrementally deal with all the issues of the House of Lords. I am sorry to break to it to them, but that is not going to happen.

[Richard Baker (Glenrothes and Mid Fife) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman’s party has long talks about constitutional change in this country, but it is our party that delivered devolution in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, as well as a Mayor for London and the London Assembly. His party has only talked about it. Is that not the reality of our party delivering on constitutional change?

[Pete Wishart]

Yes, of course we are delighted that we have the Scottish Parliament. I congratulate and thank the Labour Government for delivering that, and they were right, but they have never delivered anything when it comes to the House of Lords except the reforms of 1999. That is the only thing that they have brought forward, other than this pathetic, minuscule Bill that does something that should have been done centuries ago. We are supposed to congratulate them and thank them for getting rid of the most ridiculous class of parliamentarians anywhere in the world: the hereditary peers of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. It is absurd. Well done for finally getting rid of the barons, the dukes, the earls and all the other assorted aristocrats! That should have been done centuries ago.

The commitment that I am waiting for from Labour is the commitment that it gave over a century ago. Do Labour Members know what that was? They do not know what it was, so I will tell them. A Labour party commitment from over 100 years ago—I cannot remember the exact year—said that it would abolish the House of Lords. That is a historic commitment by the Labour party that it has not even come close to realising, but it is now—thank you, Labour party!—getting rid of the earls, the dukes, the barons and the graces, so I suppose we have to be thankful for that.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

I would be interested to hear the hon. Gentleman’s assessment of how that radical reform from 100 years ago is going. I appreciate that he may not have studied the Labour manifesto—many Labour Members have not done so either—but it states that Labour aims to make a

“second chamber that is more representative of the regions and nations.”

I wonder whether he could share his thoughts on how that is going, and whether he thinks that Mrs Gray will be able to contribute to that in a significant manner.

[Pete Wishart]

Let’s just say that the progress has not been all that was anticipated or all that we hoped for. We could say that progress has been practically non-existent. We also had the crushing news today that our British envoy to Scotland will no longer be going there to represent this Parliament as part of her duties in the nations and regions. I can tell the House that the nation of Scotland is almost inconsolable about the fact that our envoy will no longer be going to Scotland. We were planning the street parties and practising the haka, just to make sure that she would be properly welcomed to our northern territories, but she is no longer going to be there.

[Torcuil Crichton (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (Lab)]

Although the hon. Gentleman wants to get rid of the hereditaries, his party seems to want to create a hereditary system by allowing the right hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Stephen Flynn) to stand for the Scottish Parliament.

[Pete Wishart]

I gently break it to the hon. Gentleman that no SNP Member will ever end up in an undemocratic outrage like that place down the corridor. I do not know how many Scottish Labour Members will be in Parliament for 20 or 30 years, but about 15 of the last generation of Scottish Labour Members are now in the House of Lords. This conveyor belt that rewards a distinguished career in the House of Commons with a place in the House of Lords is one of the things I want to address with my amendments.

I had hoped to table an amendment to try to realise Labour’s historical ambition to abolish the House of Lords. Thanks to the good work of the Clerks, I knew that I was highly unlikely to secure such an amendment, and that is probably right, so I thought I would be creative and try to abolish its membership. I therefore drafted a series of amendments to try to get rid of all the distinct groups and classes of Members of the House of Lords. Again, I thought I would be singularly unsuccessful in that mission and endeavour, but I have three amendments on the amendment paper.

Those amendments are crackers, believe me, but I look forward to speaking about them. They would abolish the prime ministerial donors, appointees and cronies who fill the other place, and they would abolish the idea that former Members of Parliament can assume they will get a place in the House of Lords. I am really pleased with myself.

[Melanie Ward]

It is a pity to interrupt the hon. Gentleman when he is in such a state of excitement about his work, but it is difficult to take a lecture from him on delivery when this Labour Government have delivered so much in just a few short days. He may want to talk to his colleagues in the Scottish Government about their delivery on, for example, the state of the health service in Scotland.

What is the hon. Gentleman’s stance on the multiple occasions in recent years when senior figures in his party have approached friendly peers to table amendments to legislation on their behalf? It seems that those senior figures are quite happy to use the other place when it suits them.

[Pete Wishart]

There is a point of principle behind our position on the House of Lords, and it is a simple word: democracy. We refuse to have anybody in the House of Lords because we believe that people should have an electoral mandate—democratic backing from the people of this country—to serve in the legislature. That is something on which the hon. Lady and I will never agree. I believe she is quite happy and satisfied that unelected peers continue to inhabit the other place.

My party is hopeful that the House of Lords might sometimes challenge Governments, and perhaps make them think again, but it always backs down. Any attempt to get the House of Lords to agree to any sort of principle is a waste of time.

[Gareth Snell]

The hon. Gentleman is clearly very pleased with himself and his amendments. The only seat as secure as a seat in the House of Lords is a seat at the top of a regional list for proportional representation. He has tabled a well-meaning amendment to prohibit any Member who has served in this Parliament or the last from seeking a seat in the House of Lords. Would he apply that to his own party, so that any Member who has served in this Parliament or the last is not eligible to seek nomination or election to the Scottish Parliament?

[Pete Wishart]

I say to the hon. Gentleman, ever so gently, that he should leave bypassing devolution to his friends from Scottish Labour, because they are just a little bit better at it than him. It is their job to constantly speak about the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government. To be fair to them, they have done a fantastic job—they barely even mention the UK Government. Every single contribution they make is about the Scottish Government, so maybe just leave it to them, shall we?

--- Later in debate ---

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Pete Wishart]

What is wrong with that? Maybe the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Gareth Snell) will tell me, but first I give way to the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Johanna Baxter).

[Johanna Baxter (Paisley and Renfrewshire South) (Lab)]

Is the reason the hon. Gentleman’s amendment refers only to the first three UK establishment parties so that it does not affect his own party, now that it has fallen to being the fourth largest party in this place?

[Pete Wishart]

We do not put people in the House of Lords. If people want to give us a million pounds, they can—please, if anyone is watching on TV, we could do with a million pounds. Sorry to disappoint anybody thinking about doing that, because we cannot give them a place in the House of Lords. I will give way one last time to the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central, who I have given way to once already.

[Gareth Snell]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way again. I agree with him about the necessity for probity, ethics and transparency in politics, and I also enjoy his righteous speeches in this place. Obviously, he is a moral guiding compass for us all, so will he now make a clear and unambiguous declaration that not a single person who has ever donated to the Scottish National party or served as a Scottish National party Member of Parliament has ever been given a position in a publicly funded quango, or a publicly funded seat on a board, or been in receipt of any publicly funded donation? Obviously, I want to ensure that we aspire to the bar that the hon. Gentleman sets.

[Pete Wishart]

What I can say categorically to the hon. Gentleman is that there is nobody who has given one single penny to the Scottish National party— [Interruption.] Again, I appeal to people watching, if they want to give us money, please do so, but one thing we can never do—we never have and never will—is, in return, offer a place in our legislature or the ability to govern in this country. We do not do that, we cannot do that and we will never, ever do that.

Let me point to the scale of the difficulty of the problem when it comes to the donors. Some 68 out of 284 nominations from political parties between 2013 and 2023 were for political donors who had handed over £58 million to one of the three main parties. Over the course of that decade, some 12 of them gave £1 million. Now that might sound familiar to some Labour Members—£1 million is what people used to give to the Labour party under Tony Blair in the early 2000s to get a place in the House of Lords. Come on! Where is inflation when it comes to this? We would expect it to cost £1.5 million to get a place in the House of Lords now, but the going rate is seemingly still about £1 million.

Cash for honours was a disaster for Labour. It was absolutely awful. We saw the spectacle of a sitting Prime Minister being interviewed by the police about the donations that were being given to the Labour party. Those donations were interpreted as inducements to secure a place in the House of Lords. The Prime Minister was interviewed under caution and two of his personal staff were arrested. After that experience, we would be right to expect some sort of clarity in their thinking to take place. They could have decided never to get into that type of territory again—that they would do everything possible to ensure that money was taken out of politics, so that there would never be a whiff of suspicion that such a thing would happen again. But not a bit of it. Donors still go into the House of Lords, money still goes into the political party, and the public want it stopped.

[Sir John Hayes]

I am extremely grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. I intervened merely to say this: many people might assume that he is being foolish for raising issues of financial shenanigans, mismanagement, concealing money, bribes and so on, but I think that he is just being brave. Just as a matter of record, I want it to be known by the whole House that this man is not a fool; he is a very courageous man.

[Pete Wishart]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for that. I will never again chastise him for quoting Proust in the House of Commons. I am sorry that I did that to him last time around.

That covers the donors. The other amendment that I managed to get included—again, this was a surprise to me—is one related to cronies. It would deny the Prime Minister the power to appoint people to the House of Lords. The Prime Minister has a prerogative that is almost unknown to any other western industrial leader—that he is exclusively responsible for appointing so many people to one part of our legislature. I think that something like 30% to 40% of the total membership of the House of Lords has now been appointed by a Prime Minister—by one man. That would make a tinpot dictator in a banana republic blush. He would want those powers in his hands immediately, but we have them in the United Kingdom. We allow a Prime Minister to determine—on his own—so many people in our legislature. That must come to an end. Of course, the temptation for the Prime Minister is to appoint his friends, to reward those who have been denied a place, to compensate people for losing their positions, to encourage people to take a role, but mainly it is to make sure that the donors are rewarded.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

I think we can all pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman for his genius in crafting amendments; he has been very innovative. If we saw the House of Lords Appointments Commission being put on a statutory and independent footing, that would go a considerable way towards dealing with that concern. Is that something that his party might consider supporting?

[Pete Wishart]

If that comes up for a vote this evening, we would support it. That is one way forward. It certainly would deal with some of the more egregious power that the Prime Minister has. I think that people across this country forget that our Prime Minister has this power—that he has this prerogative to singlehandedly design our legislature. The more that people learn about some of these issues the better. The one in seven who currently support these arrangements will fall to one in 70, because the place is an absurd embarrassment—by the way that it does business, by the way that it is allowed to set its membership and by the way that it presents itself to the world.

We have an opportunity this evening to improve, deal with and get some sort of solution to what this country does on a democratic basis, but the Government are not grabbing it—they are not even prepared to kick out the bloody bishops, for goodness’ sake. How on earth, in 2024, can we be in situation where we have bishops legislating in a modern, advanced, industrial democracy? It is beyond a joke.

We are removing the hereditaries, and those on the Government Front Bench are right: there is no great objection to the hereditaries being removed. I do not even sense much of a defence from some of our crustiest, oldest colleagues, who are sitting next to me; they half-heartedly feel that they have to do it for their pals, but they are not sincere and they do not really mean it. They know that time is up for the hereditaries, and quite rightly so—it is absurd that they are still a feature of our democracy in 2024.

After this, the bishops are going to stand out like a sore thumb in a cassock. They will be the ones on the frontline when it comes to the ridicule. I have a little suggestion for my friends, the clerics down the corridor: how about sticking to their ministries? It is not as if they are without a whole range of issues just now. Would they not be better deployed dealing with some of the things that we have seen in the news over the course of the past few days, instead of concerning themselves with attempts to run our country? We live in a multi-faith and no-faith complex democracy, where so few people actually attend their Church.

This historic remnant from medieval times—that we have to have bishops in the House of Lords—is totally absurd. I will be supporting the new clauses on this subject in the name of the right hon. Member for Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge. In fact, they are only in his name because he beat me to the Table Office when I was trying to remove the class of bishops through the many amendments that I tabled.

The last amendments that I managed to table are a bit more trivial, but they address something that I think we still have to consider: the idea that former Members of Parliament should automatically expect a place in the House of Lords. We all know what it is like, don’t we? Towards the end of a Parliament, we all ask each other—well, no one asks me—“Are you going to get a place in the House of Lords, then, for standing down?”, and some say, “Ooh, I think so, I think so.”

There is always that tap on the shoulder for the parliamentarian who may be in the autumn of his or her career: “We’d like you to do the right thing, colleague. Would you mind thinking about standing down? We’ve got a new youthful, more energetic colleague, who would be a bit more helpful to the Prime Minister. We’ll make sure you’re all right; there’s a place in the House of Lords waiting for you.” How about ending that? It is a feature that the public particularly loathe and despair of, and it is just not right.

If colleagues want to continue to have a place in our legislature, they should stand for election. That is what most parliamentarians across the world do. Do not expect a place in the House of Lords. I have tabled new clause 13, which would deal with the issue. It states quite clearly that no one should be given a place in the House of Lords if they have served as a Member of Parliament in the current or last Parliament. I think that is fair and I encourage the Government to think about it as the Bill goes forward.

I will not be supporting the amendments tabled by those on the Conservative Front Bench. I do not suppose that they would expect me to do so. I do not even understand them, and I do not think that they really understand them either. The Opposition seem to be encouraging the Government to move quicker when it comes to House of Lords reform, and at the same time they are telling the Government that they are going too far. I will let the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds), who is on the Front Bench, explain exactly what they are trying to achieve, because I am having real difficulty following.

I will support the Liberals Democrats’ amendments, as I think they make a reasonable stab, but I say ever so gently to my Liberal colleagues that they have more places in the House of Lords per capita than any other political party in this place, so if they are serious about developing the House of Lords, why do they not just stop appointing people? That might have an impact—because all this mealy-mouthed, silly reform is not doing anything.

I will finish on this point: this is our only chance. There will not be any more House of Lords reform, regardless of what the Government say, and I know that they have said something to their Back Benchers to encourage them to come along today and tell us that there is further reform to come. There will not be further reform. All of us have seen this before. There are colleagues on the Conservative Benches who have seen this, been there and got the T-shirt—and that T-shirt says, “No more Lords reform in this Parliament.” That is what happens.

[Mr Sewards]

I am very grateful to the hon. Member for giving way, although perhaps less so now that I realise I have put myself in his sights. Looking back to the 1999 law, it is tempting to be jaded—especially for Members who were here then—and to think no more reform is coming. Does he accept, however, that many Labour Members, including almost all those present today, are brand-new and cannot be compared with that 1999 cohort? We are prepared to make further reforms in this Parliament—after all, the public voted for change, and we are here to deliver it.

[Pete Wishart]

I will hold the hon. Gentleman to his word and hope that he is successful in ensuring that it is heard by his Front Benchers. I will also say to him—and I do not mean this with any great disrespect—that I have never seen a more malleable set of Back Benchers than the new Labour Members. They do everything that they are bid—the way they read out the crib sheets from the Whips is absolutely magnificent. I have not seen a great deal of rebellion from the Labour Back Benchers, but maybe he will show the way and ensure that something happens.

I suspect that this will be our last opportunity to consider the matter in this Parliament, because it will get punted into the waiting long grass. The person I feel most sorry for is Gordon Brown. I think he actually felt that he was going to be listened to this time, and that Labour was sincere about taking forward his agenda. After the Scottish independence referendum, we were promised almost-federalism, but instead our Parliament is getting attacked day by day, Government by Government, Back Bencher by Back Bencher. Let us see if we can get back to that almost-federalism. Let us see if we can get a degree of ambition from this Government. It might be—I certainly hope so—that their Back Benchers will hold them to account, and in us they will have willing allies in achieving that.

This is an absolute mouse of a Bill, but it could be made better by voting for and passing my amendments. I encourage the House to do so.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

--- Later in debate ---

[Pete Wishart]

I, too, congratulate the Paymaster General and his ministerial team on getting the Bill through Parliament at such pace and so early in the parliamentary calendar, as he has said on several occasions. I really hope that this will not be it. As the Conservatives have said, this really is a timid pipsqueak of a Bill.

The Paymaster General quoted Herbert Asquith’s words about the House of Lords, but could he not have quoted Keir Hardie, who pledged over 100 years ago to abolish it? Could he not have quoted Gordon Brown, who said only a few months ago that Labour would bring forward a new democratically elected second Chamber to represent the nations and regions of the whole of the United Kingdom?

Instead, what we have is the low-hanging fruit of the hereditary peers. Is it not remarkable that it has taken until 2024 to remove the earls, the barons, the dukes—all the assorted aristocrats—and we are to give Labour great credit for doing so? This should have happened several centuries ago, not in 2024.

I hope that Labour Back Benchers are not going to be disappointed, because we have heard several contributions, on Second Reading and today in Committee, suggesting that further reform is going to be coming; that these are the first stages of a whole package of reforms that will come before this House. I have to say that we have heard it all before from successive Governments, particularly Labour ones. We were promised a succession of reforms to the House of Lords, only for nothing to be delivered, so what we need to hear from Government Front Benchers is when those further reforms are going to come. We need a clear road map for their ambitions when it comes to the House of Lords, and that has to start with ensuring that that circus down the corridor is properly reformed and that we get to a position where it will be a democratically elected House.

Well done to the Government on getting this Bill through. I really hope that Labour Back Benchers have not been sold a pup and that they will get the further reform that has been promised to them, but what we really need to hear from the Government now is about solid progress on proper reform of the House of Lords.

Question put, That the Bill be now read the Third time.

Infected Blood Compensation Scheme

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Eltham and Chislehurst (Clive Efford). In me, he has another willing volunteer to assist him in the group, as he knows. He is absolutely right to pay tribute to our former colleague, the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North and Cottingham (Dame Diana Johnson), who led the group with such distinction and energy in the last Parliament. She was almost personally responsible for ensuring we had the legislative solution to take forward the compensation schemes.

I also pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Salisbury (John Glen), who made a significant difference when he took leadership on this issue for the last Government, after years of obfuscation, delay and dithering. The right hon. Gentleman got to grips with the matter and all the campaigners recognise what he brought to the role. I hope that this Minister does the same. We all acknowledge that he has made a good start. The points that the hon. Member for Eltham and Chislehurst makes as chair as the all-party parliamentary group on haemophilia and contaminated blood are absolutely right. If he continues in that curious and investigatory style, we will continue to encourage the Government to do the right thing by the infected and the affected.

I am happy to say, with a great deal of satisfaction, that we have made significant progress. We are at the point of being able to deliver the scheme, and we will start to see payments to those who have needed support and compensation so badly throughout all these decades. My only slight criticism of the right hon. Member for Salisbury is that it is a pity that we did not get the opportunity to debate the issue in the last Parliament. There was an unsatisfactory statement from the former Prime Minister, who then just disappeared. There was no real opportunity to ask questions properly. I know he made an effort to address some of the concerns, but it would have been good to hear more at that point about how the schemes were being taken forward. The general election created a massive gap, after all the energy and activity that had been summoned up to resolve the issue, but we are where we are.

The final report by the infected blood inquiry was a fantastic piece of work. I pay tribute to everybody involved in it. They went about their jobs diligently and comprehensively, and we ended up with a wide-ranging report that shed a dramatic light on all the things that had gone wrong. It paved the way to create a positive way forward that is now beginning to deliver.

We must remember why we are here: thousands of people were caught up in probably the worst health scandal this country has ever endured. It is a failure of the British state that we ended up in a situation where people, through no fault of their own, contracted HIV, hepatitis B and hepatitis C. When those who were caring for them raised concerns, they were constantly ignored and told, “There’s nothing to see here.” The inquiry was unequivocal that a compensation scheme must be set up immediately. The regulations we are debating today are essential for delivering that compensation scheme as quickly and effectively as possible.

I have been supporting victims of the infected blood scandal for about 20 years, since it was first brought to my attention by a constituent, who died about 10 years ago and is no longer with us. I remember the frustrations of those early years when I was constantly writing on behalf of this constituent just to be stonewalled—to be told that there was nothing to see and nothing further to be considered. It was that reluctance to take these issues seriously that defined those early years.

I said to the former Minister, the right hon. Member for Salisbury, that I hoped we would get some sort of separate investigation into why Members of Parliament were consistently deceived and—I shall say this—lied to by people working in the Department of Health. We were constantly writing letters on behalf of our constituents, and the replies were clearly rubbish. As a recipient of several of those letters from Ministers, I want to know why I was deceived in the way that I was. I pay tribute to Andy Burnham: he recognised this and he actually signed many of those letters as the former Health Secretary. I want to know how this came to his desk and why he actually did this.

The key thing is, as other Members have said, that the groups that are representing the community are properly listened to and are engaged in the construction of the regulations. It is too late for the regulations we are debating, but when it comes to the affected, the representative groups have to be central to the design of the new regulations. I say that because they have real life experience of this matter. They know what the issues are. They have fought for decades to get to this stage to secure this justice and compensation. I know that there is frustration. I saw the Minister screwing his face in response to the hon. Member for Eltham and Chislehurst, but those groups do feel frustrated. They feel that they are being ignored, that their concerns are not being taken seriously, and that they are getting generic general replies from the Minister instead of detailed, proper responses to their issues.

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

rose—

[Pete Wishart]

I will give way to the Minister if he will explain to me exactly why that is happening.

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

I just want to say that the hon. Member should read nothing into that facial expression. When I close this debate, I shall talk in detail about the consultation that has taken place. That includes the extensive consultation that Sir Robert Francis undertook during the election campaign—the period between me and the right hon. Member for Salisbury being in office. That was hugely important. The Government have listened and have made significant changes to the scheme. It is not about giving generic replies, as the hon. Member has suggested. The Government will continue to move extremely carefully and listen to concerns, and the Infected Blood Compensation Authority will do the same.

[Pete Wishart]

I am to grateful to the Minister for his response. I look forward to his summing up, as I know that he will sincerely try to address these matters, but I say to him that all I am doing is reflecting the concerns that I have heard from the groups that I have worked with so closely over the years. There is a sense that they are not being taken all that seriously and that they are not getting the responses and the information that they think are important.

The Minister mentioned Sir Robert Francis. There has been nothing other than glowing praise for the way that Sir Robert has carried out his business. I know that he had a useful and productive meeting with representatives of Haemophilia Scotland where everything was aired and properly discussed. There is absolutely no complaint from anybody in this House about the way that Sir Robert Francis has gone about his business. He has been up and down the country listening to the groups. But there are certain things that only the Minister can respond to, particularly when it comes to policy decisions. That is why I encourage him to hold a debate on them. He has said that he is prepared to do so, which I am grateful for, and that he has perhaps been misunderstood. The community must be given the information and advice that they require.

There are a couple of matters that I hope the Minister will address in his closing remarks. I will not repeat some of the points that have already been raised, as I know he has taken a note of them. Sir Robert Francis proposed an additional autonomy award under the supplementary route for those who had been subjected to the unethical treatment and experiments that have been described. Although that is welcome, it is not clear how the figures have been arrived at, so I would like a little more clarity on that. How have these figures been calculated?

One issue that possibly has not been raised today is those with hepatitis C who were treated with interferon. Early treatment methods for the eradication of hepatitis C had many negative side effects, which were extremely difficult to go through and had a lasting effect on those treated. Is that a group that the Minister will consider?

The future operation of support schemes is also important. The decision to continue existing support scheme payments for life for those who were registered with a scheme before 1 April 2024 was a welcome development. The House will know how important that is to me as a Scottish Member of Parliament, as we had a very effective, productive and useful support scheme that I think will now be concluded and no longer open to new members. I would like to hear a little more on that point.

Sir Robert’s report said:

“The benefits offered by the scheme to eligible recipients for financial and other support services should be no less than those offered by any of the current support schemes.”

I want to know whether that is still the Government’s position. It is also assumed, based on Sir Robert’s recommendation, that all the benefits of the support schemes will continue. It would be good if the Government could confirm their position at an early date so that individuals have clarity on their future entitlements.

Under the regulations, the Minister has the power to make arrangements for the provision of support and assistance to applicants or potential applicants for compensation under the infected blood compensation scheme. Sir Robert Francis has identified three groups to which the Minister might usefully apply that prerogative: IBCA-funded legal representation, IBCA-funded financial support from an independent financial adviser and IBCA-funded legal support to executors of estates where there are complex matters to resolve in determining entitlements and access to an independent mediation service.

My hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan) spoke about the need to ensure that representative groups are properly supported and resourced to continue their vital advocacy work on behalf of so many in the community. I would like the Minister to say a little more about the willingness of the Government to ensure that those groups are properly funded. The effort that they have put in over decades—sometimes in a solitary exercise by two or three people—is extraordinary and should be recognised as part of the scheme.

We are looking forward to the next round, and it is important that we go forward. I have queries, which I know the Minister will probably address, about why only 20 people have been contacted, as the hon. Member for Eltham and Chislehurst mentioned. I have no idea why it is only 20, so perhaps the Minister can tell us a little more about the rationale. It is right that the system be tested to see whether it is robust before it is opened to a wider community, but he has to say a little more about why it is those 20.

I am not having a go at the Minister, who I think is doing a good job; I am here to congratulate him and encourage him ever so gently to get moving just that little bit faster. We have had decades of obfuscation, a lack of progress, and people dying as they waited for compensation. This matter now sits on the Minister’s shoulders. We will be watching him and keeping an eye on it. I know that there will be regular updates to the House. Believe me, we will all be here to ensure that he is doing the right thing by the victims.

House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill

Pete Wishart Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 15th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

I cannot comment on the coherence of the Opposition in the course of that process. What we have seen so far is a pretty incoherent effort, but perhaps it will improve when we hear from the shadow Minister.

This Bill is about making immediate, long-overdue progress. The House of Lords existed for centuries as a nearly entirely hereditary House. There was an attempt to introduce life peers as long ago as 1869, with a further attempt to introduce life peers and remove the hereditary element in 1888. Despite those efforts, it was only with the passage of the Life Peerages Act 1958 that non-judicial life peers began to join the other place.

Some 40 years later, a Labour Government introduced a Bill to end the right of hereditary peers to sit and vote in the House of Lords. The events that smoothed the Bill’s passage led that Government to accept an amendment on the principle of the removal of hereditary peers. The amendment retained 92 hereditary peers on a temporary basis, until further reforms to the other place were brought forward. Despite attempts at further reform, that temporary measure is still in place.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

One of the dates the Minister missed was Labour’s pledge, which has stood for over 100 years, to abolish the House of Lords. That pledge was reiterated by the Prime Minister only a couple of years ago. Is it still Labour’s intention to abolish the House of Lords? Does he understand the cynicism about further progress, given that the pledge has not been honoured in over a century?

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

I cannot comment on the hon. Gentleman’s cynicism about progress, but our manifesto clearly sets out the Government’s position, which is that we should have an alternative second Chamber that is more representative of the nations and regions.

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[Sir Oliver Dowden]

I will make some progress and then I will give way.

Instead of proceeding with caution, the Government have done precisely the opposite. The Bill has had no pre-legislative scrutiny, no Joint Committee and no cross-party engagement. Indeed, Labour Ministers have explicitly refused to consult on the removal of excepted peers.

All that forms a pattern with Labour’s past constitutional tinkering. We have the Equality Act 2010, which both the Equality and Human Rights Commission and His Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary have said in recent months is too complicated and needs changing. There is also the Human Rights Act 1998, which, in departing from Britain’s common-law tradition, further expanded judicial review, undermining the very laws made by this Parliament and dragging the courts into answering political questions that should be a matter for the legislature. The same applies to Tony Blair’s successive surrenders to EU treaties. Those Acts created new problems for an old country, and this Bill risks doing exactly the same.

[Pete Wishart]

The right hon. Gentleman has been on his feet for five minutes and I am finding it difficult to follow him. Can he answer me directly: is he in favour of getting rid of hereditary peers and people who are in the House of Lords on birthright—yes or no?

[Sir Oliver Dowden]

I am strongly of the view that we should consider all these things in the round. There is merit here—that is why we are proposing a reasoned amendment—but the risk of proceeding in a rushed fashion is that we come to regret it, as we have on many previous occasions.

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[Gareth Snell]

The hon. Gentleman will forgive me for not agreeing with him. There is a lot of wisdom and experience in this place that can be used to improve our legislation. Even with the removal of the 92 hereditary peers, there will still be 650 peers, who have incredible insights and specialisms. The Bill removes a group of people whose only entitlement to be in the House of Lords comes from, as the Liberal Democrat spokesperson said, a birthright many hundreds of years old, and from being selected by their friends to sit with them. The hon. Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell) may not agree with me, but as my hon. Friend the Member for Telford pointed out, the election process in the other place is a farce. There are often more candidates than electors. It is almost akin to the Tory party leadership election.

[Pete Wishart]

The only other group that seems to reserve a place in the House of Lords is millionaires—party donors. Sixty-eight out of 284 political appointees between 2003 and 2013 gave £58 million to political parties. What will the hon. Gentleman do about them?

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[Sir John Hayes]

No, I am going to finish now.

A vapid fascination with now—imagine that. Of course, those philosophers on the Labour Benches will know that “now” is an illusion, as now becomes then in an instant, does it not? Yet the politics of now have an extraordinary appeal for faint hearts and weak minds. I know there are not too many of those in the Chamber, although rather more than one might ideally wish. That fascination with modernity leaves me only able to finish by quoting Marcel Proust.

[Pete Wishart]

Oh, please not! [Laughter.]

[Sir John Hayes]

I know there are students of Proust littered among the saplings on the Labour Benches. If they are truly to become oaks and leave their acorns in the soil, they need to read Proust more. Proust said that

“the most deplorable prejudices have had their moment of novelty when fashion lent them its fragile grace.”

It is a prejudice that drives the Bill. It is a prejudice that does the House no credit—or at least, I should say, does the party opposite no credit.

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[Sir Gavin Williamson]

I hate to correct my neighbour, but as I have the Labour party manifesto in front of me, I will read it to him.

“The next Labour government will therefore bring about an immediate modernisation, by introducing legislation to remove the right of hereditary peers to sit and vote in the House of Lords. Labour will also introduce a mandatory retirement age. At the end of the Parliament in which a member reaches 80 years of age, they will be required to retire from the House of Lords.”

So the manifesto talks about when the Member will retire not when the legislation will be introduced. We know the Paymaster General is an aspiring radical, potentially—

[Pete Wishart]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Is there anything within your power or your gift that can make the right hon. Gentleman stop with this inconsequential rubbish?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I thank the hon. Member for his point of order. It is not a matter for the Chair, but I am sure the right hon. Gentleman is coming to the end of his remarks. I remind hon. Members to stick to the motion and that their content could better match the matter before the House.

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[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

It is a real pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Glasgow North East (Maureen Burke). I listened with great interest to her personal journey and her remarks about the transformative power of education, and she gave a very touching tribute to her brother, which I am sure the whole House appreciated. I also pay tribute to the hon. Member for North Norfolk (Steff Aquarone), whose speech was a tour de force around his constituency and all the things he hopes to achieve in this Parliament. I wish him personally all the best for his time in this place.

I thank the other Members who made maiden speeches: the hon. Members for Filton and Bradley Stoke (Claire Hazelgrove), for Mid and South Pembrokeshire (Henry Tufnell) and for Knowsley (Anneliese Midgley). I say to the hon. Member for Knowsley that if she gets the decks out again, we will see if we can get the Deputy Prime Minister to come and join her; and to the hon. Member for Mid and South Pembrokeshire that it is maybe not best to tick off your dad in the Chamber—that is a little tip as the hon. Member goes forward in this parliamentary Session.

The first thing we have to try not to do when we consider the Bill is laugh. We have to try not to laugh out loud at the sheer ridiculousness of considering in 2024 whether places should be reserved in our legislature for a curious subset of a particular class of person, based on birthright. We have to try to stifle the guffaws that accompany the fact that a modern, complex, industrial, advanced democracy such as the United Kingdom can still have barons, dukes, earls and various other aristocrats deciding the laws of the land because they are their fathers’ sons. They secured that right in medieval times, perhaps because one of their ancestors won a decisive battle. This is parliamentary participation defined by the “Game of Thrones” principle, in which the great houses of olde England or olde Britannia knock seven shades of whatever out of each other for the right to run the country by breeding. In some way, they are our own Baratheons and Targaryens, but without the fun, the dragons and the box office appeal. It is time to break the wheel. For those down the corridor, winter must be coming.

There is no other legislature in the world that comes close to having people there through birthright, save perhaps the Senate in Lesotho, where I believe there are still places reserved for the tribal chiefs. That is the sort of company we keep.

My other initial main thought about the Bill is: is this it? We have heard about other things to come, and have been told that we should be patient because other Bills will be introduced. We have heard that from the Labour party for 100 years. For more than 100 years, Labour has promised to abolish the House of Lords, but there it sits, bigger and more bizarre than ever, awaiting the arrival of the new Labour Lords. Where is the Brownian vision of a senate of the regions and nations? Where is the “almost federalism” that we in Scotland were promised during the independence referendum? It is certainly not in the Bill. This meagre rubbish has not even got the credibility to call itself a reform. We will probably have to wait about the same amount of time that has elapsed since the barons and earls won those decisive battles for the Labour party to introduce meaningful reform.

We are getting not abolition of the House of Lords, but the long grass from the Labour party in this Parliament. A consultation is about to be embarked upon as Labour prevaricates once again. Nobody in this country believes that the Labour party is remotely sincere about abolishing the House of Lords. From the contributions we have heard so far, no one can believe that Labour Members are in favour of genuine reform of the House of Lords. Even the watering down of the watering down has been watered down, as the proposal for a mandatory age limit of 80 for House of Lords Members has been dropped. That happened because the Government found that they are disproportionately hit by the proposals; their cohort in the House of Lords is older than that of the Conservatives. It is no wonder that few people take them seriously.

What we have down the corridor is an embarrassment, an unreformable laughing stock, a plaything of Prime Ministers and the personification of a dying establishment that represents another age. With all its ridiculous cap-doffing deference, it represents almost the exact opposite of the values of my country. I am so proud that my party will never put anybody in that red-leather-upholstered, gold-plated Narnia.

While we can laugh at the hereditaries, the hon. Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare) and other Conservative Members are quite right to point to the ridiculousness of having 26 places reserved for Church of England bishops. We are the only legislature in the world that has places reserved for clerics other than the Islamic Republic of Iran. We can take comfort from the fact that the Archbishop of Canterbury is not going to embark on some sort of religious jihad, but what strange company to keep. If there was an intra-parliamentary union of serving clerics, it would be exclusively comprise Church of England bishops and ayatollahs.

It is not even the hereditaries or the Church of England bishops that concern me most. The group that concerns me most in the House of Lords is the appointees—the donors, the cronies and the placemen who end up with a role in running our country and making the laws of this land because of prime ministerial patronage. People have a place in our democracy whose only qualification seems to be an ability to give substantial amounts of money to one of the three major establishment political parties in this House.

We have evolved a legislature that is at least partly designed by one person: the Prime Minister decides who has the opportunity to take a role in running this country by appointment, based on lists drawn up by him and other British party leaders. No other party leader or Head of State has this power anywhere in the world. It is a prerogative that would make a tinpot dictator in a banana republic blush, yet we on these Benches lecture the developing world about good politics and democracy.

The temptation is to stuff the Chamber full of friends and the politically useful. It is a place to reward the servile, thank the time-servers and compensate the downgraded. Only this week, we are considering such an example; there is talk of Sue Gray ending up with a place in the Lords as some sort of compensation for her sacking. I suppose that when she goes down there, she will get an ermine coat to accompany the envoy’s ostrich feather for when she visits her most northern territory, Scotland, as the British envoy. Already, her loyal subjects are practising their haka to welcome their new envoy when she makes that journey north.

To see how bad things could get, we need only remember Boris Johnson’s list, which was full of friends, donors and former staff—a list that could not be more gratuitous. Notionally, there is a House of Lords Appointments Commission, but it is an utterly toothless body that Boris Johnson simply ignored. It has done nothing to stop the accumulation of cronies and donors: 68 out of 284 nominations from political parties between 2013 and 2023 were political donors handing over £58 million to the political parties, and 12 of those appointed gave over £1 million. That was the price during “cash for honours” in the early 2000s. We might think inflation would at least be factored in when it came to getting a place in the House of Lords, but not a bit of it: the going rate is still £1 million.

“Cash for honours” led to one of the most dramatic police investigations during the 2005 to 2010 Parliament, when a sitting Prime Minister was questioned by the police under caution. Some of his staff were actually arrested. We might think that, after all that, the establishment parties would be a little more circumspect, but not a bit of it; the cash keeps coming in, and the peerages keep getting rolled out. Even as recently as 2021, I asked the Metropolitan police to investigate the Conservative party when we found that 22 of the Conservatives’ biggest financial contributors had been made Members of the House of Lords in the past 50 years.

This Government have no plans whatsoever to do anything about the appointees in the House of Lords, save to make more of them. One of the reasons we are getting this Bill so early in this Parliament—the Conservatives are possibly right about this—is to clear the place out, so that the Labour party can put in more of its donors, cronies and place men. It is making sure that there are spaces available, and that the other place does not look so big.

The House of Lords is the most absurd, ridiculous legislature anywhere in the world. Famously, it is second in size only to the National People’s Congress of China. Bloated, ermine-coated, never been voted—it is the antithesis of everything we know about democracy. Increasingly embarrassing, probably corrupt and certainly rife for all sorts of abuse, it is an institution whose time has surely come.

We put forward a reasoned amendment to the Bill, because we want to hold the Labour party to its historical commitment to abolishing the House of Lords. Unfortunately, that amendment was not selected, but there will be opportunities as the Bill goes through the House to come back to the issue. I say to the Government, “Yes, bring forward your step-by-step incremental changes, but what the general public want is meaningful action on the House of Lords.” A YouGov poll out yesterday showed that the vast majority of the British people no longer want the House of Lords. They specifically and defiantly want it reformed. It is not good enough continuing to pass the buck for another 100 years; something has to be done. I say to Labour, “Pick up Gordon Brown’s report, for goodness’ sake, and have a look at what he says.” The Labour Government should try to enact some meaningful reform. Who knows? It may even make them popular again. It seems to be what the public want. This could be something that they do that the public would actually genuinely support.

We have waited centuries for action from the Labour party and we have got next to absolutely nothing. Now is the time for action. No more prevarication—take real action, and get dealing with that place down the corridor.

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[John Glen]

I am sorry, but it is the hon. Gentleman’s Government who are now in charge of the agenda before Parliament. It is for them to be accountable for it. I am so challenged by the poverty of ambition that exists on the Government Benches. We are given to believe that they are planning a new wave of peers, and the Prime Minister’s former chief of staff has reportedly been overheard saying that she is top of the list. The Prime Minister was previously reported as trying to make our political system better, because it had previously been undermined by “lackeys and donors” appointed to the other place. Sadly, it seems that as soon as he got into Downing Street, he discovered the Government’s own lackeys and donors were already waiting for him. I think that reflects this Government’s wider approach and attitude to constitutional reform and our institutions.

[Pete Wishart]

I am glad that, at last, somebody else has mentioned the donors, because to me they are the biggest problem we have with the House of Lords. Will the right hon. Gentleman back an amendment that says something along the lines of anybody who has given any more than, say, £20,000 to a political party should not be able to get a place in the House of Lords?

[John Glen]

I do not think we should rule out people who are successful in all walks of life, but I would look seriously at all amendments from colleagues throughout the House.

We need to come back to the facts of the matter. The House of Lords is not there as some ornamental, archaic decoration in our Parliament: it is an embodiment of Magna Carta—of power that devolved from beyond the Crown and beyond the Executive. So what is next? Is this all just a foreboding of the kind of parliamentary flagellation we can expect from this new Government? Well, not if we on the Opposition Benches can help it.

Our reasoned amendment recognises that this Government have no recognition of the need for a reasonable process for constitutional evolution and reform. Our amendment is about the careful and considerate review of change, as well as the acceptable or effective method of enacting major constitutional change. Surely it is reckless at least, and grossly irresponsible at worst, to seek to cast aside the experienced and independent voice of excepted hereditary peers, so many of whom play a crucial role in scrutinising parliamentary legislation in our nation—and some of whom have played an instrumental role in delivering government—without setting out a clear, coherent plan or narrative for what comes next, which should be scrutinised, discussed and refined. I hope colleagues will join me and support the Opposition’s amendment.

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[Ellie Reeves]

Absolutely not. I listened to the hon. Member’s contribution; the royal family and the monarchy are one of our country’s greatest assets. The contribution of the King and the working members of the royal family to public life in the UK is incredibly significant. The Government have enormous respect for the unique role that the royal family play in our nation. This reform does not affect the role of the sovereign. Ours is a model of constitutional monarchy that continues to be practised worldwide. By contrast, the UK is only one of two Parliaments in the world that retains a hereditary element. To seek to make any comparison between the two is not credible. The sovereign is our Head of State and provides stability, continuity and a national focus. Nothing in the Bill changes that.

Let me turn to the reasoned amendment tabled by the official Opposition. The Government have introduced the Bill to end the outdated and indefensible right of hereditary peers to sit and vote in the House of Lords. I am sure that the House will agree that it is important for Parliament to give proper consideration to the Bill, which reflects a Government manifesto commitment, rather than to dismiss it out of hand. Although the Government are grateful for the contributions that hereditary peers and their predecessors have made to the other place, it simply cannot be right that the second Chamber retains a hereditary element in the 21st century.

Let us be clear. Those on the Opposition Benches talked today about consultation and engagement. First, I will not take any lectures on consultation from the Conservative party, which rammed through a Budget without engagement with the Office for Budget Responsibility and proceeded to crash the economy that has left people in my constituency and across the country still paying the price in their mortgages and rents.

On the substance of the Bill, the right hon. Member for Hertsmere (Sir Oliver Dowden) could not even be clear, when asked, whether he is in favour of the principle of removing hereditary peers from the second Chamber. From the sometimes quite lively contributions from the Opposition Benches, one thing is clear: there is a wide range of views that are not always consistent with one another. The new-found, if at times slightly confused, zeal for the job of reform of the second Chamber is noted, yet Opposition Members had more than 14 years to bring about reform and never did so. Those on the Labour Benches laid out our commitments for reform in our manifesto, which was scrutinised by the public and then overwhelmingly voted for.

[Pete Wishart]

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. Will she tell the House whether it is still Labour’s ambition to abolish the House of Lords in its current condition and set up a democratically elected Chamber, yes or no?

[Ellie Reeves]

We set out in our manifesto that we want to see an alternative second Chamber that is more representative of the nations and regions. I will say a little more about that later.

Our manifesto was scrutinised by the public and then overwhelmingly voted for. This is a tightly drafted piece of legislation that directly makes provisions for the specific commitment to remove immediately the rights of hereditary peers to sit and vote in the House of Lords. I am confident that there will be no shortage of scrutiny from Members of this House and Members of the other place throughout the passage of the Bill. The effect of the reasoned amendment tabled by the right hon. Member for Hertsmere would prevent the House from scrutinising the Bill.