Camera dei Lords - Dibattito sulla riforma

House of Lords Meeting

Tuesday, 13 March 2007. The House met at noon: the LORD SPEAKER on the Woolsack. Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Rochester. Earl Cathcart, having received a Writ of Summons in accordance with Standing Order 9(7)(Hereditary Peers) following the death of Lord Mowbray and Stourton—took the Oath.

House of Lords: Reform

12.06 pm Debate resumed on the Motion moved on Monday 12 March by the Lord Falconer of Thoroton—namely, That this House takes note of the White Paper The House of Lords: Reform (Cm.7027).

Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean

My Lords, the first thing that strikes me about yesterday’s excellent debate is that whatever we on the Back Benches may think, our Front Benches—or at least the Front-Bench spokesmen on this issue—are in broad agreement. They want an 80 per cent elected House. That must give the rest of us some food for thought.

My right honourable friend Jack Straw backed the 50 percent option; indeed, he predicated a whole White Paper on that option and was soundly defeated, not just in the Commons but within his own party. The noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, having argued persuasively for the status quo, cheerfully went on to back the 80 per cent option, acknowledging as he did that his own Back Bench in this House would not support him any more than his party supported that option in the Commons. The Liberal Democrats want a 100 per cent elected House but will settle for what they can get—and who can blame them? Of course, the Cross Benches rightly prefer an 80 per cent elected element because it preserves that independent expertise, which we all acknowledge is such an important and valuable attribute in this House.

Meanwhile, the House of Commons, the elected House, has voted decisively for a 100 per cent elected Lords—and, as Jack Straw remarked last week, the genie cannot be put back into its bottle. How will the Government pursue the consensus without which, we are told, we cannot proceed?

The Government will be against any vote in this House for 100 per cent appointed Peers, but they are clearly deeply uneasy about the Commons’ decision for 100 per cent elected Peers. There is no consensus between the parties in the Commons and it is pretty clear that there will be no consensus between the two Houses, but the Government have said that they will seek consensus between the Commons vote and the Lords vote, and the Lord Chancellor said that the cross-party group—that is, Mr Straw and the Front-Benchers—will reconvene.

I return to the question put by the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth of Drumlean, yesterday about a range of views in that group, a point elegantly sidestepped by his noble friend Lord Strathclyde. I put it this time to my noble and learned friend. How will Back-Bench opinion in the political parties be represented? We have had no such representation hitherto, on that group—no one to argue for what I suspect this House will vote for. A consensus based on the current cross-party group will be no consensus at all; it will be a sham.

The Government’s unease is understandable because the decisive vote on the 100 per cent model has clear implications—at least it does for any person of common sense—for the primacy of the House of Commons. That may be why such large numbers voted in another place for the 100 per cent appointed and 100 per cent elected Peers. Some 70-odd did so, by my calculations, including 60 or so of my own party. That is an impressive number voting for two apparently contradictory positions—and, in time, those 70 will have to reach a decision to back one option or the other. However, I think that their vote at present is defensible, because this is an argument about hybridity.

The argument is that hybridity will confirm legitimacy because this House will have an elected element, which my noble and learned friend claimed provided what he called democratic connection, or the legitimacy claimed by many others. We can be legitimate, but not too legitimate, because legitimacy would challenge Commons primacy. The 20 per cent appointed Peers will be the bulwark claimed against a challenge to the primacy of the House of Commons.

The 80 per cent political or elected Members of this House will still believe that their individual legitimacy is every bit as valid as the individual legitimacy of those elected to another place. They will recognize that the cap put on the elected element in this House will be there to protect those in the Commons to the disadvantage of the electoral mandate that they have in this House. Moreover, the first time that a vote in this House turns on the 20 per cent appointed votes, there will be a constitutional crisis. An elected majority will simply not tolerate being overruled by an unelected minority, nor should they.

What of the relationship between the two Houses? Why should an elected Member in this House subvert the mandate from his own electorate to the mandate of an MP in another place? That is not democracy; it is a doctrine of, “all elections are equal, but some are more equal than others”. It is this that will be used to protect the primacy of the Commons. That primacy is not challenged—it is right that the Commons has primacy, and there is no question of it. Members in the Commons are elected, we are not—end of story. But sooner or later—and, given the vibrancy of our politics, it will be sooner—the 80 per cent elected Members of this House will challenge another place, will feel an equal legitimacy.