Tom Greatrex
Main Page: Tom Greatrex (Labour (Co-op) - Rutherglen and Hamilton West)Department Debates - View all Tom Greatrex's debates with the Cabinet Office
(11 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)
1. What estimate he has made of the cost of implementing the section of the coalition agreement on the creation of new peers.
Tom Greatrex (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Lab/Co-op)
3. What his policy is on the creation of new peers.
The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Nick Clegg)
As stated in the programme for government, appointments will be made to the House of Lords with the objective of creating a second Chamber that reflects the share of the vote secured by the political parties at the last general election. Any costs associated with appointing new Members will be in line with the current system. The responsibility for increasing the size of the House of Lords must, of course, lie with those who rejected the opportunity to move to a smaller, more legitimate House.
The Deputy Prime Minister
As I have said before, we intend to do what the programme for government sets out; we will be making appointments with the objective of creating a second Chamber that reflects the share of the vote of the political parties represented in this House. But we had a proposal before us—we all know what happened—to make the House of Lords both smaller and more legitimate, and it did not make progress.
Tom Greatrex
The previous Government were in a minority in the other place, whereas this Government have a de facto majority of 68 there. Given that they have suffered 64 defeats and counting in the other place, would the Deputy Prime Minister not be better served by trying to improve the quality of the legislation that he proposes, rather than packing the other place with more and more client peers? We would get better laws as a result.
The Deputy Prime Minister
As a matter of fact, there are more Labour peers than peers of any other party in the House of Lords. Under the last Labour Government, 173 Labour peers were created—that was just under half the total. That is not a record of which the Labour party should be proud.