Business of the House

Chris Bryant Excerpts

Thursday 21st June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

As I said at the end of that debate, it was not a good debate. I would very much welcome a debate along the lines that my hon. Friend has suggested, in which Members from all parts of the House could outline the steps that we can take individually to drive up the public’s perception of and confidence in Members of the House. If such a debate took place, I very much hope that Members on all sides would listen to the repeated injunctions from Mr Speaker that we should use temperate language and have regard to the impact of what we say in this Chamber on those who are watching.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

I am glad that you have a good sense of timing, Madam Deputy Speaker. I was sitting on the edge of my seat, waiting for news of the Lords reform Bill, but I heard nothing. Will the Leader of the House confirm that when the Bill is introduced, it will include provisions for the ending of the link between a peerage and sitting in the legislature, and that it will end peerages being given to anybody? While we are at it, should we not abolish baronetcies, because now that we have parliamentary knights, who have earned the right, and since a baronetcy can never be inherited by a woman, but only by a man, surely it is time, in an egalitarian era, to get rid of them?

[Sir George Young]

I think that was a wholly unnecessary and provocative remark! Some baronets were Labour MPs, such as Tam Dalyell. I am not sure what he would have thought about that comment. As the hon. Gentleman knows, we published a draft House of Lords Reform Bill, which proposed some of the measures to which he referred. There was then a report by the Joint Committee on the draft Bill, and the Government are reflecting on it. We will introduce a Bill to reform the House of Lords and plan to do so and to have a Second Reading debate on it before the summer recess.