King’s Speech

Lord Wallace of Saltaire Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd July 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I join in welcoming the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hermer, to his new post and to the House. I was cheered by his speech, and by the broader issues not just of the rule of law but of the need for continuing political and constitutional change and greater democratic participation of which he spoke. I am disappointed that in the list of Bills we have for this Session there is so little, so far, that takes us further in that direction. As the Sessions move on in this Parliament, I hope that those promises will be fulfilled.

I was puzzled, to say the least, by the speech given by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen—13 minutes on reform the House of Lords. From time to time, I have pondered with friends how long it would be before the Conservative preference in office for executive dominance as the principle of the British constitution would switch back to Lord Hailsham’s insistence that it was a threat of “elective dictatorship” as soon as they were out of office. I think I began to hear that switch much more quickly than I expected.

This Government came in promising change, and that change must include constitutional change more broadly—not just about the nature of this Chamber. The strongest argument for urgent political reform is that public trust in Westminster politics has now sunk lower than ever previously recorded. Some 45% of respondents to this year’s NCSR survey say that they would “almost never” trust Governments of any party. In a political system constructed to institutionalise two parties, over 40% of those who voted in the general election chose neither of them. Labour won nearly two-thirds of seats on one-third of the votes cast. Taking into account the four in 10 people on the electoral register who did not vote, only 20% of those on the electoral register voted Labour, and only about 10% voted Conservative. Do not forget that, in addition, nearly 6 million—perhaps even 8 million—of British citizens are not even on the electoral register. There are a whole set of issues about the quality of our current democracy.

The gracious Speech declares:

“My Ministers will strengthen the integrity of elections and encourage wide participation in the democratic process”,


but there is nothing in the list of Bills that follows that through. The Prime Minister, in his introduction to the King’s Speech memorandum, declares:

“The fight for trust is the battle that defines our political era”.


We on these Benches agree, but only the Hillsborough Bill, imposing a duty of candour on civil servants, begins to tackle the widespread public disillusion with Westminster and Whitehall politics.

The gracious Speech promises that:

“Measures to modernise the constitution will be introduced”.


Well, let us see them. The only measure listed is to remove the hereditary Peers from the House, which my party proposed for the first time 113 years ago. Where are the measures to entrench the position of the constitutional guardians, from the Lords Appointments Commission to the Committee on Standards in Public Life? The Government, as the Minister confirmed, will propose a modernisation committee for the House of Commons, but we need to know how long that will take to set up and that it will report, we hope, before the next general election.

We on these Benches remain committed to major reform of the UK’s second Chamber—unlike the Conservative Party, I remind the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen of Elie—as we proposed in the coalition Government 12 years ago. I painfully remember, as I trust the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, will, the two-day debate we had in this Chamber in which some, including him, argued that there was no way we could improve the current House and that further reform was completely unnecessary. However, Gordon Brown’s recent commission came up with similar proposals to those which the Liberal Democrats put forward. Removal of our elected hereditaries represents a small further reform, although there is room for negotiation on transitional arrangements, since we all agree that many of our current hereditary Peers provide valuable service to the House.

For those opposed to major reform, the most urgent problem the House faces, which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen of Elie, did not mention, is the gross imbalance between Conservative Peers and other parties. Constructive negotiations should begin with a Conservative Party offer of voluntary retirement for a significant number of its own Peers. Liberal Democrats support the principle of a retirement age—I declare an interest: I am even older than President Biden—and would consider a minimum age for appointment, which several other second Chambers include.

As to the gracious Speech’s promise to

“encourage wide participation in the democratic process”,

there is very little here to see. We need to move towards automatic voter registration to make the register fully inclusive. We need to restore the independence of the Electoral Commission, which was undermined by a government Act two years ago, and we should widen the franchise to include all those past their 16th birthday, to inculcate the habit of democratic participation into the rising generation as early as we can. Of course, we must face up to the gross distortions of our current voting system.

We need to look at the English devolution Bill to promote some means to regain trust through a more active democracy. Local democracy, after all, provides the bedrock for public participation: local councillors dealing with local problems. Successive Governments have wrecked local government in England over the past 30 years, and the last Government did more damage than their predecessors. Britain has far fewer local councils and far fewer elected councillors than any other advanced democracy. Pursuit of unitary councils and, now, combined authorities and directly elected mayors has left abandoned town halls all across the country. The current patchwork across England is a mess. We have mayors for combined authorities who do not represent recognisable communities, two-tier local government in London, unitary authorities in most but not all of the rest of the country, and metropolitan mayors being the only elected representatives from outside London whom the Government listen to. If we are to rebuild public trust and widen participation in our democracy, as the gracious Speech stated, then we have to revive local democracy. The Liberal Democrats will approach that Bill from the perspective of how we widen democracy across England and the whole of the UK.

Others on our Benches will speak about relations with the UK’s devolved national Governments. We on these Benches will be happy to engage with the Government on more ambitious plans for constitutional change, as well as, of course, on the future of reform for this Chamber, which should all be approached as far as possible on a cross-party basis.