House of Lords Reform Thread

[Flying Pig]

Nick Clegg's Lords reform plans 'could mean Lib Dem humiliation'

Plans to reform the House of Lords will lead to "humiliation" for Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats, one of the party's hereditary peers has warned.
Many Conservative MPs and peers across the parties are said to oppose the scheme, which involves electing most members of the Lords for 15-year-terms.
The Earl of Glasgow told the BBC his party risked looking "foolish" and Lib Dem election hopes could be damaged.
But former party chief executive Lord Rennard said people backed the plans.
Liberal Democrats within the coalition government are pushing for Lords reform, including electing 80% of peers and almost halving the total number of members to 450.
But many Conservatives oppose the plans, with 93 MPs rebelling against the government in a vote earlier this month - the largest such act of defiance since the government was formed in 2010.
'Foolish' Ministers lost a vote to impose a "timetable", limiting the maximum amount of debating time to be put aside for the issue. This means it could be "talked out", with opponents making long speeches to limit the prospects of the House of Lords Reform Bill becoming law.
The government is expected to try to overturn this result in the autumn.
But the Earl of Glasgow, a hereditary peer, told BBC Radio 4's World at One he had written to Mr Clegg to warn him it was "not a good time" to promote reform.
He added: "It's probably going to get bogged down [in Parliament] and I don't think it's going to get through. It's going to be another constitutional humiliation for Nick Clegg and, therefore, the party."
He was referring to the referendum last year on whether to replace the first-past-the-post system for electing MPs with the alternative vote method. The referendum was a condition of the coalition agreement but the Lib Dems, who supported the change, lost.
Another defeat over Lords reform would "make us look rather foolish", Lord Glasgow said, arguing that it would damage the party's prospects at the next general election.
He added: "I don't really think it's the time now to be having internal fights within the parties, when we should be dealing with much more important things, like the economy.... it could be very damaging."
But Lord Rennard, the Lib Dems' former chief executive, said it had been "Liberal policy to reform the House of Lords for 100 years".
He acknowledged it was "not the most important issue to people", but added: "Most people support the idea of people electing members of the House of Lords, rather than leaders selecting them."
Former Liberal leader Lord Steel has proposed a separate bill, including forcing retirement for those who fail to attend or are convicted of crimes. This was backed by peers earlier this month.
However, he has emphasised that this represented a "small start" and was not an alternative to Mr Clegg's reform programme.

For those unaware, one of the major points in the Liberal Democrat (the junior partner in our ruling coalition) manifesto was the reform of the House of Lords. Currently, the Lords is composed primarily of 'life peers', who are appointed as an honour for their service in fields such as the arts, the Armed Forces, or in politics; senior churchmen, and hereditary peers whose seat is passed down through the generations. Recent reform has dramatically shifted the balance from hereditary peers (most of whom lost their seats under Blair) in favour of life peers, but it still holds that the Upper House of Parliament does not contain a single elected member.

Clegg is keen to see the Lords turned into something more like the US Senate, with the vast majority of its members elected for 15-year terms. His Conservative partners have said that this is not neccessary for it to be a part of our democracy, and generally think that there are bigger things to be worrying about at the moment.

Is an unelected upper house compatible with democracy? How should a reformed house function? Is this the wrong time to be dealing with such issues?

Will this hurt Clegg politically?

 

[Ajidica]

I was under the impression the House of Lords was where you guys shoved inbred upper class twits and popular figures to keep them busy, not to attempt any real governance.
It seems having the House of Commons is enough, I don't see why you guys need another group to govern.

 

[WindFish]

I was under the impression the House of Lords was where you guys shoved inbred upper class twits and popular figures to keep them busy, not to attempt any real governance.
It seems having the House of Commons is enough, I don't see why you guys need another group to govern.

Because only a third of our legislature is Democratically elected.

 

[Flying Pig]

I was under the impression the House of Lords was where you guys shoved inbred upper class twits and popular figures to keep them busy, not to attempt any real governance.
It seems having the House of Commons is enough, I don't see why you guys need another group to govern.

Most countries have some sort of upper house. The logic is that the Commons is occupied by people on short terms, who have to please 'the mob' on an almost-daily basisi, so party politics, one-upmanship and generally rash thinking can sometimes mean that their legislation is badly thought-out. The Lords are immune to these pressures, so they can be more considered (looking stupid in a debate has no ramifications for a Lord's career, but it could end an MP's) and sometimes make amendments which are not very popular outside of Westminster, but which prevent bad ideas from becoming law. This is why even under the proposed system, elected Lords would have 15-year terms: after that long, nobody's going to remember a specific one-liner that you made in a debate; the voters' impression of you will have to be based on your long-term record and personal character. The US Senate has five-year terms, which go some way towards creating this effect: the atmosphere in there is a lot more civilised and convival compared with the House of Representatives.

Because only a third of our legislature is Democratically elected.

Yes, but it is the big third.

 

[Ajidica]

I was under the impression that the fully democratic House of Commons did the governing and the House of Lords/Monarch just rubber stamped it.

 

[Cutlass]

The American in me says to reduce the House of Lords to no more than a ceremonial function, with no power in government at all. People have made the case in the past in the US for a unicameral legislature. And while I'm undecided on that in a place where the upper house is elected, I would certainly support it over an upper house that is appointed and/or hereditary. And a case can be made for it even in an all elected republic, seeing as how dysfunctional Congress has been recently.

 

[WindFish]

I was under the impression that the fully democratic House of Commons did the governing and the House of Lords/Monarch just rubber stamped it.

No

The House of Lords can challenge bills that came from the commons but the Commons can override this via the House of Lords Act (1911).

The worry is that a democratic second house is going to make it like the US senate and gridlock the British political process into oblivion.

 

[Flying Pig]

I was under the impression that the fully democratic House of Commons did the governing and the House of Lords/Monarch just rubber stamped it.

The Lords can attach amendments to bills; it can't totally block them (although there is something called a 'wrecking amendment' whereby the Lords return the bill to the Commons with an amendment designed to be unacceptable, in the hope that the whole thing will be rejected). The Queen rubber-stamps all legislation passed in good faith; the last time the Royal Veto was used was under Queen Anne.

The worry is that a democratic second house is going to make it like the US senate and gridlock the British political process into oblivion.

I hadn't come across that one before - how much of a gridlocking effect does the Senate have on US politics? I know that due to the different election processes - two Senators per state rather than deciding based on population - their ideological compositions can be very different: presumably this wouldn't happen in the Lords.

 

[WindFish]

I hadn't come across that one before - how much of a gridlocking effect does the Senate have on US politics? I know that due to the different election processes - two Senators per state rather than deciding based on population - their ideological compositions can be very different: presumably this wouldn't happen in the Lords.

Well, if the HoR and the Senate don't agree, they seem to gridlock

 

[Cutlass]

I hadn't come across that one before - how much of a gridlocking effect does the Senate have on US politics? I know that due to the different election processes - two Senators per state rather than deciding based on population - their ideological compositions can be very different: presumably this wouldn't happen in the Lords.

It can get bad. But the worst part of it is actually the internal rules of the Senate that make most bills require 60 votes before moving on. That's a very tough standard when it is rare that either party have 60 members. But it cuts both ways. The House gets blocked from both doing good things and bad things.

It's even more disruptive to the executive in the US, because the Senate can, and currently does, block the appointments of judges and appointed officials in the government for purely partisan reasons.

 

[Flying Pig]

I'm not sure how it would work under the proposed system, but the influence of political parties in the House of Lords is negligable when compared with the Commons.

 

[Core Imposter]

A mob is the method by which good citizens turn over the law and the government to the criminal or irresponsible classes.

Ray Stannard Baker

 

[BvBPL]

I think there’s something to be said for adjusting the House of Lords. For one, I think that diminishing its size and increasing the size of the directly elected house would be helpful in that it may increase the ability of other parties to participate more fully in the democratic process. For a parliamentary system, the UK seems pretty stuck on a dichotomy of two parties.

That said, I think having life peers who serve as experts on their particular subjects is very valuable to the nation. It gives rise to a technocratic union who, owing no formal allegiance to any given party, are more free to give their opinion on key matters.

 

[Dachs]

I vote you line all of the Lords up against a wall and shoot them.

 

[Flying Pig]

That said, I think having life peers who serve as experts on their particular subjects is very valuable to the nation. It gives rise to a technocratic union who, owing no formal allegiance to any given party, are more free to give their opinion on key matters.

That is one of the great strenghts of our system. We also have the 'Law Lords' who are very high-level lawyers; they sit on the Supreme Court. It's good to have strong legal minds scrutinising the law-making process, since they'll be the ones having to work with bills once they become law.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

As for the OP,

I believe an unelected house is incompatable with democracy. But I am also of the opinion that a monarchy, no matter how reduced in power it is, is even more incompatable.

While admitting that I do not have a firm finger on the pulse of the British public, I'd say that pushing to abolish the House of Lords at this moment will hurt the Lib Dems.

The Lib Dems need to be seen standing up to far-right Torries and making sure that their own proposals and agendas are at least given lip service. I don't think attacking the House of Lords accomplishes that at the moment. Maybe after the Eurozone crisis has settled down and the inevitable fight to renegotiate treaties with the EU has been resolved it will be more opportune.

For now they better focus on hospital reform and the like.

Plus the US Senate itself is in need of major reform at the moment - I wouldn't hold it up to the UK as a good alternative to the House of Lords.

 

[LegionSteve]

My preferred suggestion for reforming the house of lords is to get rid of it. Ideally by getting Lord Sugar to fire them all, and then fire himself.

I get the theory, nicely explained by Flying Pig, of having a 2nd house to try to stop the most ******** legislation getting through. I'm just not convinced they do that job very well in practise. I could be wrong though, and I am willing to be convinced if someone has a good suggestion for a democratic 2nd house.

What worries me about an elected 2nd house though, is how many people will bother to vote. The number of people who vote in local elections is worryingly low. And Big Brother got kicked from channel 4 to channel 5 because people couldn't be bothered to vote for that anymore. If not enough people vote, it will be like the European parliament elections, where nutters like the BNP can get in

That is one of the great strenghts of our system. We also have the 'Law Lords' who are very high-level lawyers; they sit on the Supreme Court. It's good to have strong legal minds scrutinising the law-making process, since they'll be the ones having to work with bills once they become law.

That is a very good point. OK maybe we do need some sort of 2nd house. I'm still not convinced by the libdems idea though.

Also, from the BBC article:

Lib Dem election hopes

 

[BvBPL]

That is a very good point. OK maybe we do need some sort of 2nd house. I'm still not convinced by the libdems idea though.

I think the 15 year elected term is a horrible idea. It encourages party loyalty in fits and starts, and may place party loyalists in some high, unassailable aerie from whence they can force-feed the legislature their party's claptrap with little fear of a response from the citizenry. Much better to have experts assigned to the roles of permanent advisers and be free of party politicking.

 

[Flying Pig]

So an elected-for-life second chamber, a bit like the Roman senate?

 

[bathsheba666]

I was under the impression that the fully democratic House of Commons did the governing and the House of Lords/Monarch just rubber stamped it.

A lot of legislation is not well thought through, and the Lords has a number of competent reviewers who can think constructively, in addition to the chinless wonders, of whom there are now fewer.

The Lords also can resist legislation that is toxic or over partisan.
Although the Commons can always overrule this resistance if they are so inclined, democracy is better served by principled resistance on occasions, and compromises occasionally result.

I am not convinced by the idea of the second chamber being democratically elected, the Commons is sufficient for this purpose.

The President / Congress / Senate botch up and road crash seems an adequate reason for why we wouldn't want to in any way ape that system.


Clegg is a total & ^ % $ £ .
Also, to be hurt, he would require a functioning central nervous system.

Whatever arguments there are for increasing representation, and there certainly are, they can be conducted via the Commons.
And the main argument for the Lib Dems was to introduce a more representative voting system, which they duly royally screwed up.
I hope they at least manage to pay back the tory scum for that one.