House of Lords Reform Bill

Alison Seabeck Excerpts

Monday 9th July 2012 Commons Chamber

[Sadiq Khan]

The draft Bill advocated the Prime Minister having the power to appoint Ministers, who would be members of the legislature for as long as they were Ministers. However, the Bill published last week says they can stay for 15 years, which is really quite remarkable.

[Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)]

I thank my right hon. Friend for making public the historic levels of indecision on the Liberal Democrat Benches in respect of House of Lords reform. On the 15-years issue, the Deputy Prime Minister says this House contains career politicians. Surely, a 15-year job is a career.

[Sadiq Khan]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right: 15 years non-renewable hardly leads to accountability.

A key absence from the Bill is that there will be no referendum. The Government have opted to impose their proposals on the public, rather than trust the people with a vote on House of Lords reform. We think that is an error, and it runs contrary to the growing tradition that major constitutional change should be put to the people in a referendum.

It is not only Labour that calls for a referendum. The Joint Committee also unanimously called for a referendum:

“The Committee recommends that, in view of the significance of the constitutional change brought forward for an elected House of Lords, the Government should submit the decision to a referendum.”

This Bill is much weaker as a result of the Government refusing to include a referendum.

We heard a number of defences of that position from the Deputy Prime Minister. He said a referendum was not needed because proposals to reform the House of Lords were in all three main parties’ manifestos. The manifestos said very different things, however. While Labour and the Lib Dems called for a wholly elected second Chamber—albeit Labour wanted a referendum as well—the Conservatives sought only to find consensus. It is not simply semantics to argue that the Conservatives never actually gave a commitment to reform the House of Lords; they gave a process commitment to seek dialogue to find common ground.

--- Later in debate ---

[John Thurso]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. For my own part, I have been consistent in my views ever since I started to think through the matter seriously, and for me the key part is legitimacy, for so long as the other place—

[Alison Seabeck]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[John Thurso]

No, I have given way twice, and that is it, so for the avoidance of doubt I will do so no more.

The critical point is that the other place is not regarded as legitimate by us, by the media or by the public at large. If we had an appointed upper House that was regarded as legitimate, as indeed Canada does, that would be worth considering, but we do not. As long as there is no election, the upper House will not be considered legitimate, so we have to move towards election.

We need to observe four key principles. First, we need to look at the role of the other place. It does its job up until the point at which what it has done leaves the other place and comes here, so I want the other place to be a place that continues to scrutinise and to advise.

Secondly, we need to take the best of what exists. For example, the reason the House of Lords works well is that the Whip is lighter—some would even say, “consensual” —up to a certain point, because one cannot be thrown out. By seeking, therefore, to replicate that with long terms and no re-election, that same flavour will come through. Further to that point, and absolutely fundamentally, there should be no competing constituency interests. That is why PR and large constituencies are so important—so that those who are elected cannot claim to represent a county, a division or a town. That is absolutely vital.

Thirdly, reform should be gradual: it should be brought in over a period to allow the customs and mores of the other place to survive the transition. The fourth point, which is also of prime importance, is that the upper House should not compete with the House of Commons as the place to form the Government.

So I look to what is in the other place now, but the one thing that none of us should be able to support is the status quo. It clearly cannot be right in the 21st century to have half our legislature composed of the rump of the aristocracy, together with the great and the good who have benefited from whatever their parties might have chosen to prefer them with.

It is extremely important that we look to an upper House that has legitimacy, has elections and replicates the good parts, but that does not replicate, or seek to replicate, the bad parts. I happily left the other place in 1999 to take my retirement from it, but when I did so I made a prediction to the colleagues whom I left behind, saying that the next stage of reform would not be nearly so easy. I did not for a moment believe that those who had kicked, screamed and gouged their way to party preferment, and had arrived in the other place after all that hard work, would be as happy as I was to leave. That, indeed, seems to be exactly where we are.

I have friends in all parts of this House, not perhaps political friends but none the less friends, and I know how many of them would like to see the other place reformed, so I say to all reformers in this House: we have a once-in-a-generation opportunity; for God’s sake, let us take it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Graham Brady (Altrincham and Sale West) (Con)]

I am delighted to follow the Chairman of the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee. I share much of his analysis but arrive at the opposite conclusion.

The Deputy Prime Minister builds his case on three broad themes. First, there is his claim about the manifesto commitments. It is clear, however, that the Conservative manifesto contained no commitment to legislate—the Prime Minister famously described it as a third-term issue. Regardless, however, I would urge my hon. Friends to think carefully about their responsibilities as Members of this House. We are not delegates sent here to nod through whatever our parties ask, but representatives sent here to exercise our judgment in the public interest.

I would also like to reflect on the case for a referendum. If it were true, as the Deputy Prime Minister said, that all the major parties promised the Bill at the general election, then contrary to the assertions of the Ministers, the public were presented with no choice at the general election, so the case for a referendum on such major constitutional change is compelling.

[Alison Seabeck]

The hon. Gentleman is giving a thoughtful speech, as have other Members. If it is possible to have a referendum in a local authority—for instance, on something to do with council tax—surely it is absolutely right, on an issue as significant as this, that the British public should be offered the same choice.

[Mr Brady]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. The case is compelling. Ministers really cannot have it both ways.

Much of what has been said about the Bill, however, concerns not party commitments but calculations of party advantage. We spend too much time here pursuing party advantage. To do so in changing our constitution would be not just wrong but contemptible.

Let me turn to the other parts of the Deputy Prime Minister’s case—the points of principle on which I hope the House will judge any proposal to effect a massive change in our constitutional arrangements. These are whether reform is needed and the argument that there is an absolute principle that those who legislate for the people should be chosen by the people. There has been an effort to paint opposition to the Bill as reactionary opposition to any change. Nothing could be further from the truth. Few on either side of this House or in the other House would dispute the need for reform. The Lords is too big and it needs a route to retirement. It also needs a means of removing those found guilty of serious crimes. All this, as my hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing) said, could be enacted with little dissent here or in the other place. However, desirable as reforming the Lords may be, I would contend that reforming the Lords without reforming this House would be to miss the point.

The public are not stupid: they know where power is located in our Parliament. They know that it is in this House and not the other. People certainly dislike politicians who break promises or who seem interested more in seeking or holding on to office than in serving the public good, but this is seen as a failing in the House of Commons far more than in the House of Lords. People notice that this House is poor at holding the Government to account. They see that we make only a desultory effort at scrutinising legislation—although I trust that this Bill will be an exception. People see the damaging effects of patronage—against which Lord Ashdown railed in the weekend press—but they know that patronage is a greater impediment to the freedom of this House than it is to that of the Lords. We are agreed that the House of Lords needs reforming, but reforming the Lords while flunking the far more important task of strengthening the Commons would be profoundly mistaken.