House of Lords Reform Bill [HL]

Lord Howe of Aberavon Excerpts

Friday 3rd December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howe of Aberavon]

My Lords, the House has had the privilege of hearing my noble friend Lord Steel proposing, supporting and explaining this Bill on a number of occasions. On each occasion, the case becomes clearer. I pay tribute, as I am sure many colleagues do, to the energy, intelligence, integrity and determination with which he has continued to present this case. It has formidable support in this House, which should be taken fully into account by Members of the Government. I do not propose to add anything to what he has said in support of the propositions contained in his Bill because they are all now clearly understood and it is hard to see that any of them are challenged. There has been a curious inertia and unwillingness on the part of both Governments to whom he has presented the case, and it is time that it was accepted.

I therefore propose to address my short remarks to one issue that he did not discuss; namely, the case for or against the arrival of elected Members in this House. The existence of two Houses of Parliament goes way back into history, and it is not quite clear which was on top when, but it is clear that the democratic House that emerged in the late 18th or early 19th century has grown in strength and legitimacy, and nobody now challenges the right of the lower House to override anything that is done in this House.

This House has changed significantly as that has gone on. This House has had the benefit of two steps that increased its legitimacy—if that is not the wrong word. The first was the invention by Harold Macmillan, the distinguished predecessor of the present Prime Minister, of the nominated Peer, which injected stimulating yeast into the existing organisation. The second step was taken by the Government recently in power under the leadership of Prime Minister Blair: the removal, subject to an intelligently struck deal, of the great bulk of the hereditary Peers. Against that background, we now have to proceed as quickly as possible with the implementation of this Bill and finally address whether there should be elected Members. That is why I propose to take a minute or two to talk about that.

One does so on the foundation of the commendation of this House as it presently exists and the identification of the cause for concern about it. The basic proposition is endorsed by the fifth report of the Wright committee in the other place, which I have quoted many times. It is an enthusiastic endorsement of the quality and importance of this House and a warning that it is all too easy to see qualities of that kind disappearing if fashion changes. It is in that context that I quote the current Leader of the House Sir George Young MP when he said that,

“the real contest today is not between the Lords and the Commons but between Parliament and the Executive. In that battle, the two Houses are not rivals but partners”.—[Official Report, Commons, 10/1/2002; col. 728.]

That insight was subsequently endorsed by the Wright committee in its fifth report. The presumption that sits uneasily alongside the Wright committee’s thinking is that,

“the principal cause of today's ‘widespread public disillusionment with our political system’ is the ‘virtually untrammelled control ... by the Executive’ of the elected House”.

That is the consequence of the link between the Executive and that House through the democratic system. That is what we are dismayed and disturbed about.

If we have both Houses increasingly looking like each other with a large or substantial or growing percentage of elected Members in this House, the difference between them would be destroyed, the superiority of the Commons would increasingly be involved in conflict with this House because the Houses would be growing in strength alongside each other and no good purpose would be served that would enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of this House. That is why the Wright committee, whose report I quoted last time I spoke about this subject, said that there is a need,

“to ensure that the dominance of Parliament by the Executive, including the political Party machines, is reduced and not increased”.

That is essential if we are to get the benefits of the proposals contained in my noble friend’s Bill. The second point that the Committee made is:

“The Second Chamber must be ‘neither rival nor replica, but genuinely complementary to the Commons’ and, therefore, ‘as different as possible’”.

It is fundamental to the beneficial prospect of what my noble friend is proposing for us to stand firmly upon those propositions. It is not that I have any hostility towards election or democracy. Like many Members of this House, I respect the importance of the other place, but the importance of the other place needs to be liberated from the dominance of the Executive, and one of the agencies through which that can be assisted is the continued independence and difference of this House. It surely cannot make sense for the most fundamental change proposed to the second Chamber—the introduction of elected Members —to be the one most likely to extend the influence of the elected dictatorship that so manifestly provokes disenchantment with the present elected House.

I have dealt only with that one issue. It is not irrelevant to the Bill proposed by my noble friend but is an important foundation for securing its benefits. I enthusiastically endorse the work that my noble friend has done and invite the House to accept the other premise on which that work will be allowed to flourish.