House of Lords Reform Bill

Harriett Baldwin Excerpts

Monday 9th July 2012 Commons Chamber

[Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears). I found that I could agree with much of her speech—although certainly not all of it. That is also my view of this Bill: it is not a perfect Bill, but neither do I think the House of Lords is perfect. That is why I am more than happy to vote for the Bill on Second Reading, but I would not be prepared to support it in its current form on Third Reading.

I have mulled over the idea of a Committee of the whole House having 10 days to amend the Bill. Given all the other important work this Government also have to do, that may well be enough time for us to find consensus. Indeed, I am hearing a lot of agreement on some points. I think there is consensus that we must reduce the size of the second Chamber, for instance.

[Geoffrey Clifton-Brown]

My hon. Friend has obviously read the timetable motion as carefully as I have. Does she realise that it gives only two hours for Third Reading? As any votes will eat into that time, there may well not be a Third Reading vote on a Bill that is of such great constitutional importance.

[Harriett Baldwin]

We could oppose Third Reading, therefore, if we felt we had not achieved consensus in this House.

There is also consensus in this House that anyone who has been convicted of a serious crime should be kicked out. The cost of the second Chamber must be reduced, too. I am not convinced on this point; I will need quite a lot of convincing in respect of the Deputy Prime Minister’s earlier assertion that this proposal would be cost-neutral.

[Jesse Norman]

The cost figures have reached their current level only by the entirely illegitimate manoeuvre of including costs—such as costs of the Commons associated with the Lords—that have not yet been recognised in legislation, let alone achieved, as well as by ignoring the £85.7 million cost of five-yearly elections.

--- Later in debate ---

[Harriett Baldwin]

My hon. Friend makes some wise points, but it is unlikely that an elected Member of the second Chamber would be able to get by with only one member of staff, which is an assumption made in the costings. There are a number of questions about that issue, and I think we would all want the cost to be at least lower than it is now.

Let me deal with the contentious areas, where there might be more disagreement across the Floor of the House. I am strongly in favour of the bishops continuing their constitutional role in the second Chamber. They play a valuable and important role, and reflect the fact that we have an official Church of England role in our constitution.

[Ian Lucas]

rose—

[Harriett Baldwin]

I have given way twice, so unfortunately I do not have time to do so again.

On the question of what voting system we use, I am aware that the coalition agreement said that we would use proportional representation and that it has some attractions. Some of the things we like about the second Chamber at the moment, such as the fact that some distinguished former Members of this House have been appointed to it, could be continued were we to carry on with that voting system. I would fight for Baroness Thatcher to be top of any list that the Conservative party would field, so from that point of view there are some merits in the PR system. However, it is clear that in many countries where PR has been used it is an extremely unsatisfactory system. Israel elects its “Commons” on the basis of PR, which often ends up giving the balance of power to undesirable elements. I would have a significant concern about that.

I think we all agree that Cross Benchers play an extremely important role, and if I were to move in any direction from what is proposed, it would be to give an increased weight to them. However, I now wish to discuss something that has not been mentioned—the geographical problems of what is being proposed—and relate it to my private Member’s Bill in the last Session on the West Lothian question. In its current form, the Bill would clearly exacerbate problems with the West Lothian question. We have yet to see the report from the West Lothian commission, but I anticipate it in this Session of Parliament. A further look at how the upper House worked would clearly need to be taken because of the West Lothian question, so I throw out a proposal to colleagues: rather than have the much larger geographical constituencies proposed in the Bill, let us do away with the geographical link altogether and have national proportional weighting in the allocations in the upper House. Such an approach would completely sever the geographical link, which I know a lot of colleagues have expressed concerns about, and would solve the West Lothian question.

[Mr Gray]

rose—

[Harriett Baldwin]

I have taken two interventions and have only a couple of minutes left. I want to allow many colleagues to contribute, so unfortunately I will not give way.

I wish to conclude by saying that I hope we can use the 10 days available to move forward constructively with the things the House agrees on. I hope that in this Session our proposals will carry the majority of the House, so that we can look back on this opportunity to reform the House of Lords and say that we did not fall into the temptation to filibuster and talk out the Bill, but were able to leave behind, for future Parliaments, a more reformed second Chamber.