Size of the House of Lords

Lord Wallace of Saltaire Excerpts

Tuesday 18th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I agree with the noble Baroness that the role of the Official Opposition is extremely important, and new Peers have been appointed —the Prime Minister has nominated people to the Labour Party Benches. Indeed, I had the great privilege of hearing the maiden speech from the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, only last week.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, may I follow the question of the noble Baroness, Lady Smith? The Labour Party acted with great restraint in the first 11 years after the 1999 reforms. It was six years before there were more Labour Peers than Conservative, and at the end of the Labour Government there were only 26 more Labour Peers than Conservatives. We now have 83 more Conservative Peers than Labour, almost as many as there are all other party Peers. Do the Government intend to respect the convention that no group should have a majority in this House or do they intend to carry on appointing more until they approach an overall majority?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the Conservative Party has only about 33% of the seats in the Lords, which obviously is way short of its share of the vote. This House has always benefited from negotiation and balance. However, there is a fundamental principle of our constitution that the Queen’s Government must be enabled to carry on, and everybody watches very closely the relationship between this House and the House of Commons.