Draft House of Lords Reform Bill

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Monday 30th April 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Dobbs]

My Lords, one can wait for years for a report to come along, then two arrive at the same time. I should like to add my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and all those concerned with the Joint Committee report and the alternative report. The default position for supporters of the draft Bill is that it is needed because of our democratic deficit. I think that it was the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, who compared us earlier today to Belarus—or was it Baluchistan or Bahrainistan? Anyway, he was very angry about it and proclaimed that our country’s democracy is in terrible danger, so why not let us give this democracy thing a go and wander down the path to see where it leads?

The first thing to be said about democracy is that it is not simply about voting. Lots of countries have voting, but that does not make them democracies, and if voting were the answer we would already be in Camelot. Over the past 20 years we have elected more politicians than at any time in our history, yet the other day Hansard Society reported that political disengagement and disillusion in Britain has reached record levels. But, we are told, we have got to have more of the miracle cure—more elected politicians because the people want them, including an elected Lords. The noble Lord, Lord Shipley, has just told us that opinion polls prove the point. But that leaves me wondering, if opinion polls are so meaningful, why, for instance, do we not bring back hanging or get out of the European Union? Democracy can be a funny old game and we should kick it around with care.

Rather like the committee, I wonder why those who speak loudly about the merits of democracy are so often the same voices raised to deny the people their say in a referendum. I seem to recall spending much of last year being whipped through the Lobbies to vote for dozens of different referenda for every new EU post from dog catcher to crèche convener. We have the money to spend on all that, but we have neither the time nor, it seems, the will to ask the people about one of the most significant constitutional changes in a century. The committee saw this as being profoundly inconsistent, and it was right.

As so many noble Lords have pointed out, we are in the midst of a double-dip recession, yet here we are with a Bill that proposes to shove still more taxpayers’ money down the throats of politicians. Is that really what democracy is about? Ask the Government how much more money and they come over all coy and refuse to answer. They have not worked out the sums, so they say, perhaps because the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, has got there first and exposed just how costly this Bill would be. But let us not argue too much right now about the odd few hundred million; I am sure the people will understand what good value an elected second Chamber would be. However, my suspicion is that high up the list of democracy’s demands is for a Parliament that is above board and honest, or at least reasonably so. I am long enough in the tooth to know that no Parliament is ever painted pure white, but if you were to ask the people which of this country’s Houses of Parliament has a reputation for scandal and sleaze and self-interest, they would not be pointing the finger at this end of the building.

There is another awkward little thing. Democracy demands a Parliament that makes sound laws: government for the people. But what the people seem to get as a matter of course nowadays is something totally different: legislation that starts off being ill-conceived then goes on to be ill-considered as guillotines chop their way through debate and sensible discussion—at least until it gets to this, unelected, Chamber of Parliament. If there is a democratic deficit in our system, it is not at this end of the building. Yet the cry goes up: let us have elections, more elections. Where will it stop? Should we elect our judges too? There is just as much logic in that. Or should we even elect our monarch? Suddenly, voting does not seem as much fun or so necessary.

There is one final argument that gets used to establish this Bill’s democratic credentials, which is that it was in all three party manifestoes. I have an admission to make: I am a Conservative. In the 18 or so words with which this matter was set out in my party’s manifesto—widely read from end to end of this country, I am sure—it called for consensus. That is what I feel bound to and that is what, over the coming months, I will do my best to achieve. The noble Lord, Lord Richard, and his committee have spelt out just how difficult that will be, but we must live in hope. And while we are struggling to achieve consensus, we can leave the Government to concentrate on their own noble struggle to dig us out of our economic mess.

The hour is late, so let me conclude. I am very keen on the reform of this House, but this misbegotten draft Bill is not it. The Bill will not do, and it is so demonstrably flawed that it will not go through. The people will not understand, nor will they forgive, if the Government waste months of parliamentary time on this self-indulgence when they should be putting their interests and future first.