Draft House of Lords Reform Bill

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Wednesday 6th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Grenfell]

I, too, welcome the composition of the committee: it is a very good choice of Lords’ members. With regard to the coalition Government’s attitude towards this process, I am inclined to Voltaire’s view that common sense is sometimes very uncommon. The Deputy Prime Minister has recently been saying that he wants to incorporate into the legislation much of what is in the Steel Bill. How does that square with what the noble Lord, Lord Williamson of Horton, said, in issuing his Augustinian warning that speed should not be too speedy? If we follow those two courses, the excellent recommendations in the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Steel, will not be incorporated until some very distant time, when possibly the legislation might become an Act of Parliament. I feel that the coalition is looking a gift horse in the mouth. This gift horse actually has extremely good teeth, and they should buy it. If we have to wait until legislation is passed, which may be a very long time indeed, we miss out on the possibility of instituting the extremely important, sensible and needed reforms that are recommended as an interim measure in the Steel Bill.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, I endorse what has been said and refer to one other passage in the resolution before us, which says that,

“the Committee have power to appoint specialist advisers”.

The noble Lord, Lord Richard, is indeed a sagacious man, and he has an excellent but very large committee. I suggest that the committee looks at the existing powers of your Lordships’ House and commissions a study to find out how far those powers have not been used by your Lordships’ House acting in a spirit of restraint. Only yesterday, my noble friend the Leader of the House asked for 14 Motions to be approved en bloc. It was pointed out on the Order Paper, as it is every time we have such a Motion before us, that all those things could be individually debated. Could an elected House not debate them at great length? Could an elected House, in conflict with the other elected House and in disagreement with the Government of the day, not cause absolute chaos by exercising the powers that we currently have but do not exercise? I ask the committee to look at just how far your Lordships’ House has exercised self-restraint in recent years, and at what would be the consequence if all the things that we could debate were debated, often at great length, and voted on. This is entirely relevant to the committee’s discussions. Since it has the power to send for people and papers, and to appoint advisers, I ask that this be considered.

My only other point is that the committee appears to have carte blanche to travel around the United Kingdom. I wish it well in its travels, which I hope will be lengthy and enjoyable. However, if the committee is to look at the effect of elected second Chambers, would it not be appropriate for it also to do some foreign research?