Draft House of Lords Reform Bill

Lord Rodgers of Quarry Bank Excerpts

Monday 30th April 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rodgers of Quarry Bank]

My Lords, I, too, congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Richard, on his labour of love in chairing this demanding committee. I also thank my colleagues, my noble friends Lady Scott of Needham Market and Lord Tyler, who were members of the committee and worked long and hard. It is a very useful report as far as it goes, but that is not very far. We might have anticipated this, given the purpose and terms of reference of the committee, and its membership. In the introduction to the report, we are reminded of the principal milestones in the long march since the 1998 White Paper and my noble friend Lord Wakeham’s royal commission. The 15 divisions tell the story of substantial failure. Instead of a consensus on a matter of the highest constitutional significance, the committee was often seriously divided.

Since the royal commission, opinion has, however, moved on the primacy of the House of Commons. At least, my own perception of it has. What is much clearer now, given the report and today’s debate, is the inescapable challenge of an elected or partially elected House of Lords to the Commons. I share what other speakers have said on the importance of paragraph 34 of the report, which states:

“The Committee is firmly of the opinion that a wholly or largely elected reformed House will seek to use its powers more assertively”.

It adds, in paragraph 35, that:

“The Committee considers that a more assertive House would not enhance Parliament’s overall role in relation to the activities of the executive”,

and, in paragraph 55, that:

“We concur with the overwhelming view expressed … in oral and written evidence that Clause 2”—

the crucial clause—

“of the draft Bill is not capable in itself of preserving the primacy of the House of Commons”.

I also note that David Howarth, my Liberal Democrat former colleague in the Commons and now a reader of law in Cambridge, said in evidence on Clause 2 that it “is just silly”.

In a previous debate on 22 June, I said that the House of Lords and the House of Commons were,

“joined together in a single Parliament. The balance of powers … works very well despite some rough edges. After scrutiny, debate and negotiation in Committee, including … ping-pong, the elected House of Commons … wins, and so it should be”.—[Official Report, 22/6/11; col. 1267.]

Despite the report and the valuable evidence, and what we have heard in today’s debate, I remain firmly opposed to a wholly or partially elected House. That was my view when I joined this House 20 years ago, and since then it has been broadly the same. Perhaps I may say again, especially to my colleagues on these Benches, that 13 years ago I wanted to end then the hereditary principle in the House—quite a different matter from election, but a major reform. Alas, my then leader in the Commons, my noble friend Lord Ashdown, did not see it that way.

At no time have I justified the status quo. Given a non-elected House, I could be happily persuaded by a number of important further changes, given a relaxed open choice in details across the parties. I would be content to have 400, 450 or 500 parliamentary Peers. They could serve for 15 or 20 years and retire at 75 or 80. As for the Lords spiritual, having read 24 paragraphs and seven recommendations in the report, I could support 12 Bishops, only two—such as the two we have seen here today—or none at all. I would not be upset if those who remained in the second House became Senators. For me, these are all tolerable options.

What should happen as 22 or more men and women sit around the Cabinet table and try to agree the final draft of the Bill to reform the Lords? Perhaps they should push the Bill through both Houses, through thick and thin, in a clean sweep. Perhaps they will be attracted by the alternative way forward, which was drafted as a minority report, of setting up another committee to examine the conventions between the two Houses. Perhaps they should split the Bill, proposing important changes but stopping short of an elected House, with a further legislative stage some time ahead in the next Parliament or beyond, as I would prefer. Above all, as Cabinet Ministers sit there, they should have at their elbow that enjoyable autobiography of Rab Butler, The Art of the Possible. The coalition, which I strongly support, is passing through hard times, as are my Liberal Democrat friends. It should remember that politics is the art of the possible and think of priorities for the nation and the voters in these difficult economic and social years.