House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) (Abolition of By-Elections) Bill [HL]

Lord Anderson of Swansea Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 3rd December 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)]

My Lords, another fundamental principle is that no Government can bind their successor, or a successor after that. As a wag may say, this is déjà vu yet again. Here we are after so many debates. Much remains the same since the last debate, the debate before and the debate before that. We have the same arguments and the same speakers —save the noble Lord, Lord Hannan—and much remains the same.

The noble Earl, Lord Howe, said in reply to the last debate that the proposals represented significant reform for which there was no universal support. It was hardly significant reform—merely a modest, incremental step—and if one says there has to be universal support, that reminds me of the Polish constitution of 1793, under which every member had a veto and which led to total immobilism. That is hardly something that any democratic assembly would want.

No doubt the same flimsy arguments as before have been deployed. Even with the additions following the latest by-elections, the 90 plus two are all men and come from the same rather elitist background. The only parallel I know is the Guurti in Somaliland, the hereditary chieftains who form the legislative body. I went there on two occasions to lecture them on democracy, and heard an enormous murmur of approval when I said that our two countries stood alone in the world on this issue.

The only major change since the last debate is that the Prime Minister, by his appointments, has brought your Lordships’ House into disrepute and increased demand for more fundamental reform. A few weeks ago, I was at a reunion lunch with a number of colleagues who joined the same organisation as I did in 1960. I was asked—I believe in a spirit of genuine curiosity—how one gets into the House of Lords. Perhaps they were as surprised as I was to find that I was in this place. I could only reply: “Have you got a spare £3 million?”. The Prime Minister’s actions make Maundy Gregory a mere amateur. It must surely be an embarrassment to Members opposite. It may be that he values the additional Conservative support from the hereditaries, of whom there are 42 Conservatives, two Labour and three Liberals. The numbers have already increased immeasurably.

Your Lordships must surely remember that at some time there will be a non-Conservative Government, and the disproportion in Members of this House will have increased even further, if only because of the passage of time and the age differential between the two parties. There will then be an enormous temptation on the part of the incoming Government to redress the balance in their favour. The numbers will become even higher and your Lordships’ House will be even more absurd. Of course, we accept that the current hereditary elements play a disproportionate role in the House, but it is surely a lottery to imagine that their sons—I emphasise sons, and not daughters—will fall into the same category and do the same.

I conclude by saying a sincere thank you to my noble friend Lord Grocott, who has shown that ridicule is perhaps the best argument to use against the current status quo on hereditaries. He keeps on knocking at the door currently barred by the filibuster of a small group and the inaction of government; but one day that door will open. Future generations will then surely marvel that we allowed this absurdity to last for so long in our democracy; that a small minority of bitter-enders seemed determined to block any reform—even small, modest, incremental reform—until it became a tradition: the hallmark of the ultimate Conservative diehard.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Northbrook (Con)]

My Lords, I acknowledge the tenacity of the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, in promoting this Bill, and for reaching the age of 80 since we last debated it. It is for another day to discuss whether, in normal times, Private Member’s Bills which do not pass your Lordships’ House should have the same priority in the next Session. I do not like the decision to remove equal chances of any Private Member’s Bill succeeding in the ballot, by instead cherry-picking a group on a rather unfair basis without consultation with the House.

As my noble friend Lord Trenchard has already said, the Bill is a breach of a promise given in 1999. On June 22 that year, Lord Denham asked the following question of the Lord Chancellor:

“Just suppose that that House goes on for a very long time and the party opposite get fed up with it. If it wanted to get rid of those 92 before stage two came, and it hit on the idea of getting rid of them by giving them all life peerages … I believe that it would be a breach of the Weatherill agreement. Does the noble and learned Lord agree?”


The Lord Chancellor replied:

“I say quite clearly that … the position of the excepted Peers shall be addressed in phase two reform legislation.”—[Official Report, 22/6/1999; cols. 798-800.]


I also remind the House of the importance of the then Labour Lord Chancellor’s words on 30 March 1999:

“The amendment reflects a compromise negotiated between Privy Councillors on Privy Council terms and binding in honour on all those who have come to give it their assent.”—[Official Report, 30/3/1999; col. 207.]


For the hereditary Members of the House at that time, of which I was one, it was a vital part of the 1999 Act and a key condition for letting it make satisfactory progress through the House. Nothing could be clearer than a former Lord Chancellor’s words: that is why I believe that the Bill indeed breaches the Weatherill agreement and the House of Lords Act 1999, as does a current hereditary Labour Peer. I also believe that, as a matter of principle, such major constitutional reform should be implemented by government legislation rather than by a Private Member’s Bill.

[Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)]

Does the noble Lord agree with Lord Salisbury that that agreement was brought about by undue pressure and substantial threats at the time?

[Lord Northbrook (Con)]

No, I do not agree with that.

The current system for the election of the 92 can be fine-tuned. The change I would like to see is that all replacements should be elected by the whole House, which would give more logic to the Labour and Liberal by-elections in particular. Overall, the system controls the number of hereditary Peers to a fixed number and has produced good-quality replacements. The hereditary Peers are a strong link with the past, a golden thread that goes back to the first separate sitting of the House in 1544. Until relatively recently, in House of Lords terms, the House was entirely hereditary. By-elections provide a way into this House that is not dependent on prime ministerial patronage.

Since we last considered such a Bill from the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, the problem has been in controlling the number of life Peers—there have been no fewer than 62 new creations since the previous time we debated the Bill—and getting equal quality. I suggest that there should be elections among their numbers at each election to keep the total size of the House to, say, 500. To monitor quality, there should also be a statutory appointments commission whose verdict cannot not be overruled by the Government.

The Government’s response to the Burns committee report, which recommended limiting the size of the House by a different method, was not encouraging. It said:

“The Government does not … accept the Committee’s recommendation that the Prime Minister must now commit to a specific cap on numbers, and absolutely limiting appointments in line with the formula proposed”;


hence it appears there will be no limit on the size of the House. If and when the Labour Party gets back into power, as the noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Swansea, so rightly said, it will also have to appoint a considerable number of new Peers to get its legislation through, so the size of the House will keep increasing.

With regard to further reform, we have also been promised a constitutional rights and democracy commission. I believe that we should wait for what this produces before acting on any constitutional Private Member’s Bill. In summary, though, significant legislation to implement phase 2 Lords reform should be brought forward by the Government rather than by a Private Member’s Bill.