House of Lords Act 1999 (Amendment) Bill [HL]

Lord Robathan Excerpts

Friday 9th September 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rennard (LD)]

My Lords, last week, the Lord Speaker, the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, said in an interview with The House Magazine:

“I don’t think we can justify a situation where you have over 800 peers at the same time as you’re bringing down the Commons to 600 MPs”.

In my view, this Bill is the logical next step towards reducing the size of the House of Lords. It should be easier to agree than many measures that have been considered, because it involves no compulsory redundancies.

It is thanks to the endeavours of my noble friend Lord Steel of Aikwood and others, including the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, that we passed a measure of reform in the last Parliament, enabling, as he said, 50 Members of the House to retire since then. But it is a great shame that the other measures proposed in what became known as the Steel Bill were blocked. This was particularly so after the failure to agree properly a programme of reform under the last Government’s measures, despite the House of Lords Reform Bill being passed at Second Reading in the House of Commons by 462 votes to 124. The problem with securing further progress on that Bill was that Labour Party Members believed, possibly correctly, that blocking it was their only hope of blocking the Boundary Commission proposals in the last Parliament, while, on the other hand, David Cameron and the Conservatives appeared to realise only too late that failure to secure progress on Lords reform would indeed be used to justify the Liberal Democrats blocking the Boundary Commission proposals at that point.

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord will know very well that the coalition agreement did not tie Lords reform to the Boundary Commission. Boundaries were tied specifically to the vote on AV. Is that not correct?

[Lord Rennard]

My Lords, the noble Lord is correct in terms of the technicalities of what was in the coalition agreement of 2010. However, it was argued and voted on overwhelmingly by this House and the other place in 2013 that there were many reasons why the Boundary Commission proposals should not go ahead at that point, one of which was the failure to make progress on Lords reform. Reducing the size of the House of Commons from 650 MPs to 600 MPs was not appropriate when we did not reform the House of Lords and make government more accountable in that way.

So now we have to look again at the other measures that were proposed in the Steel Bill, including the ending of by-elections to replace hereditary Peers. Parliamentary by-elections to elect MPs have been a major feature of my political life. However, I cringe with embarrassment at the holding of by-elections in this place in which as few as three Members of your Lordships’ House, who initially inherited their positions here based perhaps upon what their ancestors did centuries ago, choose to elect someone to help formulate the laws of the land from a shortlist of as few as three other people who can be considered by virtue also of what their ancestors may have done.

All of us enjoy showing family, friends and guests around the House, particularly, I would suggest, those from overseas. Some of them come from established democracies and some of them come from places struggling to establish democratic principles. But none of them can understand the archaic way in which we are still choosing some of the people to sit in the second Chamber of our Parliament—supposedly the mother of parliaments. Of course, as the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, said, not a single woman has ever been elected in this way, as most hereditary peerages descend down the male line.

A year ago, the Guardian published a letter from me saying:

“The election by hereditary peers of the ninth Duke of Wellington (Report, 16 September) to the House of Lords by 21 votes over the Marquess of Abergavenny and the Earl of Harrowby (six votes each) is incomprehensible by any democratic standard”.

On 3 December 2010, in an earlier debate on this subject, I said that,

“the farcical process we have in this House of holding by-elections to elect hereditary Peers brings the House into disrepute. These by-elections have little more resemblance to democracy than the campaign run by Lord Blackadder when he ran the by-election campaign to elect Baldrick in the rotten borough of Dunny-on-the-Wold, where Blackadder was the only elector”.—[Official Report, 3/12/10; col. 1696.]

I was wrong, of course, to describe Edmund Blackadder at that point as a Lord; he was merely a voter in that incarnation—albeit the only voter. In that series, Baldrick was later appointed to the House of Lords by Prince George. But if they had both been appointed in real life, their descendants might now be standing as rival candidates, hatching cunning plans to win by-elections in order to get back into this place.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Robathan]

My Lords, I rise to speak with the huge experience of 10 months in this House, although I worked with the House of Lords for some five years when I was the Deputy Chief Whip. I speak with some temerity, particularly after the speech of my noble friend Lord Norton and other noble Lords who are involved in the Campaign for an Effective Second Chamber, who are doing a great job. I agree with much of what the campaign says, which is to the effect that incremental reform or evolution is better than revolution. Perhaps I may compliment the noble Lord, Lord Grocott—I hope that he will not take this the wrong way—on his speech, which was witty and extremely well argued, and it is difficult to disagree with much of what he said. Nevertheless, I do not support the Bill.

I should say by way of a starter that the great British public are not sitting on the edge of their seats waiting for this Bill to pass. They are not particularly concerned about Lords reform. What they want is effective government and effective legislation. That requires greater scrutiny than this one particular Bill. So the question I want to pose to anyone who supports the Bill or is looking at Lords reform is this: what is the problem that we are trying to solve? It is not the quirky, let us call it, election of the noble Viscount, Lord Thurso, who deserves very much to come back here and take his place. However, if the Liberal Democrats did not like the election procedure, they could perhaps have not had a by-election. I do not know what the exact rules are, but presumably if no one had voted, no one would have been elected. The problem is not that quirky by-election or the hereditaries, who in my experience both before and now as a Member of the House of Lords certainly work as well and as hard as many, if not most, life Peers. They pull their weight, if I can put it like that. The problem is not the Bishops, although I rarely agree with the heads of my Church about some of their pronouncements. The problem, as my noble friend Lord Cormack just said, is that there are too many people in the House; what is actually the problem is that there are too many life Peers.

All of us in this House have a vested interest because we do not want to leave the place. I have been here for only 10 months and I would rather not be kicked out next month. The House is something that we believe to be of value and which we enjoy, and it is quite comfortable. But if one were to ask the British public and if they were to get concerned, they would say, “Why should one be appointed to a House for life and live out one’s days here?”, because one does become less effective after a time. If we are lucky, we will live to a ripe old age, but that does not mean that, when one reaches that ripe old age, one should still be in a position to assist with the legislation of this country. I suggest that the retirement system that we have already heard about is a step in the right direction, but I have to say that there should probably be a mandatory retirement age. Perhaps there could be a mechanism whereby someone who remains particularly active can remain here. He is not in his place, but I do not think that my noble friend Lord Lawson will mind if I name him; he was my predecessor in Blaby. Although he has been in this place for almost 25 years and is past 80 years of age, he remains active. We also need to look at time limiting life peerages so that they do not last for life after all. We should all be able to contribute, but sometimes other people should be able to come in and contribute as well. Again, perhaps there could be a mechanism for those who make a major contribution to remain.

As everyone in the Chamber knows, there are in this House some really outstanding people with great expertise and others who have somewhat less. I am not going to name anyone as I look around the Chamber, but some very distinguished former Cabinet Ministers are here, as well as some distinguished former trades union leaders. There are quite a lot of people with whom I served in the House of Commons. We can judge for ourselves whether we are distinguished or not. I was a medium-ranking Minister, but I suspect that the reason I was sent to this House is not unconnected to the fact that I was heavily involved with David Cameron’s campaign. As I recall, the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, was Prime Minister Blair’s Parliamentary Private Secretary. We are here for all sorts of reasons. We will not delve into them, but we know that there are other people who could be quite good for this place as well. Perhaps we should not be entirely selfish and think that after 12, 17 or 22 years, as a matter of course we should become time limited.

A limit on the number of appointments was raised, and I absolutely and wholeheartedly support that. This place is too big, so limiting the number of appointments will lead inevitably to the numbers shrinking. I think that a certain number could be allowed in each year and that it should not be exceeded. The noble Lord, Lord Howarth, asked what conceivable justification there can be for holding by-elections. I would say that many people, whether discussing the issue in school debates or whatever, would ask what conceivable justification there can be for having an appointed House of Lords. I support a House of Lords that is appointed because I think that in general it can, and does, do a very good job. On hereditary matters, an argument often made 20 years ago was this: if one gets rid of the hereditary principle completely, one must ask why we have a hereditary monarchy, which by the way I support entirely.

I have detained the House for long enough, but I shall end by trying to answer the question which I think was put by the noble Lord, Lord Grocott: who is to blame for this unusual by-election system? The noble Lord was there at the time, but as I recall I think it was Tony Blair.