Completing the Reform
Our response to the White Paper (pdf)

Britain's Deficient Democracy

The House of Lords

Lords Reform Updates

February 2007 Another Forty Years

There will be another 40 plus years of legislators-for-life if government proposals for reform of the House of Lords made public by the Labour Leader of the House of Commons, Jack Straw, are agreed. The current legislators-for-life would be allowed to keep their seats until they died. Even then 50 per cent of the legislators could be representing themselves in the legislature, not the people.

These proposals were in a White Paper published in February that is intended to set out the final stage for reform of a legislative chamber that still includes hereditary legislators and legislators representing the Church of England.

Members of Parliament will have, however, a "free vote" that will allow them to reject the 50-50 proposal. They will be able to decide on the proportion of legislators that should be elected. The options will range from no elected legislators to a fully elected chamber. If any members of the reformed chamber are elected they will represent the same regional constituencies as members of the European Parliament. These representatives of the people will no longer be given the feudal title of "Lord".

In an arrangement rather like allowing criminals to form the jury, the approval of the legislators-for-life is required for any reform of the House of Lords to become law. The "Lords" are reported to be dead set against the loss of their feudal privileges.

The White Paper allowed the Conservative Party, long a staunch opponent of democratisation, to say correctly that "these reforms will not lead to a more democratic and independent House of Lords". Party spokesperson Theresa May said "While the Conservatives believe in election by the many, Labour’s reforms would mean selection by the few".

Mr. Straw expressed the attenuated British understanding of the rights to the people prior to the publication of the White Paper with the statement that "In a modern democracy, it is difficult to justify a second chamber where there is no elected element – where the public has no direct input into who sits in it".

November 2006 People May Be Denied Rights Again

The government announced in the “queen's speech” to parliament on 15 November that it will propose legislation to reform the House of Lords. A second chamber entirely elected by and accountable to the people seems unlikely, however, unless the elected members of parliament take a stand for democracy.

The government said that it would seek a consensus on how the feudal legislative chamber should be changed. A white paper is expected before the end of the year. But press reports suggest that this will propose that only a proportion of the legislators be accountable to the people.

Following the “queen's speech” international development minister Hilary Benn called for the government to lose its power to nominate legislators to seats in the House of Lords. However, he wanted only eighty per cent of the legislators to be elected by the people. The rest, he said, should be chosen by the elected legislators in what is now called the House of Lords.

A committee of the unelected legislators has reported that it believes the present undemocratic arrangements work well and should not be changed. The committee was chaired by John Cunningham, an unelected Labor legislator. It was appointed to look at how the balance of power between the democratic and feudal chambers might be regulated. Mr. Cunningham is reported to have said that the reformed chamber should be “largely appointed or wholly elected”. He believed that it would be illogical for it to be a mixture of both elected and unelected legislators. Mr. Cunningham said that there was no consensus on what should be done.

Jack Straw, leader of the House of Commons, is reported to have recommended to the committee that only 50 per cent of the legislators be elected. The rest would be appointed. He also proposed that the number of legislators be reduced by one third, that no more legislators-for-life be appointed and that there be guaranteed quotas for members of ethnic minorities. Mr. Straws intends to make firm proposals to Parliament by the end of 2006. Labour MPs will not be obliged to vote in accordance with the policy of their party.

The conservative and liberal democrat parties want more elected legislators but only 80 per cent.

The current House of Lords legislators inherited their seats or were nominated by the main political parties. A number bought their seats by making large donations to one of those parties. None was chosen by or is accountable to the people.

Allegations being investigated by the Metropolitan Police that seats in the Lords were sold to wealthy benefactors are causing a scandal in Britain. Giving away these seats free of charge is still widely considered to be acceptable.

April 2005 PM gives way on election of legislators

Prime Minister Tony Blair is said to have put aside his opposition to the election of House of Lords legislators after long arguments in the cabinet. As a result the Labour Party election manifesto included a commitment to a free vote on the composition of that chamber. It is likely that this will eventually lead to the election of the majority of the legislators.

Other promised reforms include the removal of the remaining 92 hereditary legislators-for-life, a limit of 60 days on the time for which the Lords can delay legislation passed by the House of Commons and a ban on Lords blocking manifesto commitments.

Tory legislators-for-life are expected to be ferocious in their resistance to the democratisation of the Lords.

March 2004 Hereditary Legislators Reprieved

There will be no more reform of the House of Lords in this session of parliament, the government has announced. This means that the remaining 93 hereditary legislators-for-life will keep their seats in the legislature for the time being.

The decision not to go ahead with a bill to remove the hereditary legislators was taken because it seemed likely that the majority of legislators-for-life who are not Labour Party supporters would overrule the wishes of the elected legislators in the House of Commons. The government also feared that its own legislators in the Commons might try to amend the bill to require that legislators be elected.

The government is going ahead with a bill to removed senior judges from the legislature, however, after an agreement with tory legislators-for-life to limit the time for which the bill will be delayed in committee. This attempt to separate judicial and legislative functions is still expected to meet tough resistance from conservative legislators-for-life.

February 2004 Indirect election proposed

At a Fabian Society conference in February House of Commons Leader Peter Hain suggested that legislators in Parliament's second chamber be indirectly elected. Election would be by a "secondary mandate" system under which seats would be allocated according to the parties' share of the vote in the general election to the House of Commons. Under this arrangement the parties, not by the people, would choose the legislators.

According to the Financial Times it is likely that Hain has the support of Prime Minister Tony Blair for his proposal.

September 2003 All hereditary legislators to go

The constitutional affairs secretary has announced that the government will propose legislation to remove the remaining 92 hereditary legislators from Parliament. New legislators-for-life will continue to be appointed however, under the supervision of a statutory commission.

The conservative party leader in the House of Lords threatened a "major fight" against the reform. Legislators-for-life from other parties also protested that their illegitimate power would be weakened if all members of the second chamber were appointed.

February 2003 Parliament votes against elections

A majority of MPs have voted to prevent election by the people of the legislators who sit in the second chamber of parliament. There were 272 in favour but 289 against.

In the House of Lords, where legislators-for-life were able to vote on whether they should be chosen by the people, three-quarters voted to block democratic reform.

Most observers had expected the Commons to compromise on one of seven options for reform presented by a joint committee of both houses of parliament that mixed varying proportions of elected and appointed legislators. All of seven were voted down by MPs, however.

Some MPs put the blame at the door of PM Tony Blair, who had confessed his opposition to a democratic second chamber shortly before the vote. Both he and Chancellor Gordon Brown failed to vote.

Twenty-five members of Tony Blair’s government did vote against his preferred outcome - an all-appointed second chamber. Conservative party leader Iain Duncan Smith supported the election of 80 percent of legislators.

The joint committee will now consider what to do next. Most observers thought that the failure of MPs to agree would delay change until after the next general election.

The possibility of removing hereditary and clerical legislators as an interim step has been put forward by Downing Street. Supporters of a democratic chamber may resist that, however, as all the remaining legislators would be state-appointed.

Jack Cunningham, who chairs the joint committee, has proposed an alternative approach - indirect election by the members of the Scottish parliament, the Welsh assembly and the as yet not existent English regional assemblies.

December 2002 People’s rights may be denied in legislative reform but people will foot huge bill

A legislative chamber with no elected legislators is among the options for reform of the House of Lords to be considered by parliament in 2003. It is included in seven choices set out in a report by a joint parliamentary committee which may lead to legislation a year from now. The 600 unelected legislators could cost the taxpayers £230M a year.

The committee, in which 12 legislators-for-life from the feudal Lords carried equal weight with 12 elected members of parliament, agreed that the powers of the reformed chamber should not be expanded. They were split over whether the second chamber should have democratic legitimacy, however.

The seven options for the composition of the chamber set out by the committee include a fully elected chamber, although it is clear that it was frightened by that prospect. Others allow for elected elements of 20, 40, 50, 60, and 80 per cent of people’s representatives. The option of no elections is also included. In all but the democratic option a state appointments commission would appoint some or all legislators.

The committee recommended that the 91 hereditary legislators who still sit in parliament should lose their seats. Those of the current legislators-for-life who did not inherit their seats might continue to be legislators for as long as they wanted however, since the committee was "not attracted" to the idea of removing their privileges. New law-makers would sit for 12 years.

The joint committee made no definite recommendations on whether the supreme court should continue to be a part of the legislature. Nor on whether the Church of England should keep its power to appoint legislators. However, it did hold out the possibility that judges might continue to sit in parliament even if the supreme court became independent. It also suggested that that other religious groups might join the Church of England with a privileged place in government.

No other democratic legislative chamber would have as many legislators as the 600 proposed by the joint committee. Earlier this year Public Accounts Administration Select Committee recommended that membership should be only 350. The consequent cost to the taxpayers of this huge assembly would be £230M each year, £170M more than at present.

Commentators expect members of the House of Commons to favour election to 80% of the seats in the reformed chamber, while legislators-for-life will vote for only 20%.

The joint committee report is here

May 2002 Parliament To Formulate Reforms

Tony Blair’s plan for a legislative chamber to replace the House of Lords that was 80% unelected seems to have been abandoned. Government ministers have announced that they want Parliament to draw up its own proposals for reform.

Some MPs hope that this change of tack will allow reforms to be agreed by the time of the next general election. Other commentators suspect a plot by Tony Blair to delay reform further in response to the hostility with which his plans were met. His government will certainly try to block any added powers for the second chamber.

A joint committee of MPs and unelected legislators from the House of Lords will draw up a range of options for reform of the composition and powers of the second chamber, possibly by the time of Parliament’s summer recess. When these have been debated by both chambers more detailed proposals will be prepared as a basis for legislation.

The change of plan seems to be the result of division within the Cabinet, opposition from MPs and the public response to the White Paper in which the government set out its intentions.

"Be it enacted by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same."
The preamble to a parliamentary bill in the "mother of parliaments."

There were more than 1100 responses to the White Paper. Although there was no overall majority the largest proportion of those who commented (45 percent) wanted an all-elected second chamber. Twenty eight percent more favoured between 51 and 79 percent elected legislators. In total 89% of respondents called for the majority of legislators in the reformed House to be elected, a serious rebuke to government plans for only 20 percent.

The continued right of Church of England bishops to sit in the legislature, favoured by the government, was rejected by 56 percent of the fewer than 200 individuals and groups who commented on this. An even larger majority of those who commented on the presence of senior judges in the legislature rejected their right to seats in the reformed House.

There was also little support for continuing to call the second chamber the House of Lords. The largest number of those wanting a change of name preferred “Senate.”

Few of those who responded to the White Paper commented on the powers of the new House. Of those who did 66 percent wanted it to have the same powers as now and 32 percent called for additional powers.

Sixty one percent of responses were from individuals rather than pressure groups.

A statistical analysis of the responses to the White Paper is available at www.lcd.gov.uk/constitution/holref/holrefindex.htm

November 2001 The Government's Idea of Democracy

In November 2001, almost two years after receiving a Royal Commission report called A House for the Future, and almost three years after the setting up of that commission, the government announced its proposals for the "final" stage of reform of the second legislative chamber, the House of Lords.

There would have been 600 members of the chamber, composed of the following:

16 Church of England clerics, appointed by their church, not elected by the people.
12 judges, appointed by a government minister.
332 appointed by the political parties.
120 appointed by a government commission as "independent" members. The composition of this unelected cabal would reflect the racial and "cultural" makeup of the country. Thirty percent, at least, would be women.
An unspecified number of government ministers appointed by the government.
120, a minority of 20%, elected by the people of Britain.

The major parties would have been able to appoint new legislators following general elections to the House of Commons, in order to ensure that the balance in the Lords reflected the new balance in the Commons.

The Church of England complained that the 16 legislators it was offered were not enough.

The only good news for democrats was that the remaining 92 hereditary legislators would lose their seats. However, non-hereditary legislators-for-life are to be allowed to stay in the bastard chamber for another 10 year. Other legislators would serve for a fixed term, instead of the current life terms. The government has not decided whether it wants 5, 10 or 15 year terms.

The legislators would no longer be known as Lords. However, the chamber would continue to be called the House of Lords, with the legislators known as Members of the House of Lords! To put it another way, Lords would not be members of the House of Lords. And members of the House of Lords would not be Lords!

These legislators would lose the right to veto secondary legislation. They would still be able to delay such regulations as well as delay Bills that have been passed by the democratic chamber.

There was little immediate support for the government’s proposals. 155 Labour MPs signed a motion calling for wholly or substantially elected second chamber. Newspapers reported Tory MPs as characterising the proposals as an “insult to democracy.” Senior Conservatives were said to be considering aligning themselves with Labour and Liberal Democrat MPs in support of a “more democratic” chamber, despite their party’s past defence of hereditary legislators. Tories accuse the Prime Minister of wanting a second chamber composed of “cronies.”

A opinion poll conducted the week after the report was published suggested 70 percent support for an elected Senate to replace the Lords. The government is allowing 3 months for consultation on its proposals. The report, called, Completing the Reform is available from www.lcd.gov.uk/constitution/holref/holreform.htm

Note
The membership of the Lords peaked in 1999 with 1273 legislators. Of those 758 were hereditary legislators. The first stage of reform reduced the number to 614 in 2000, including 92 hereditary legislators.

The Royal Commission

The Royal Commission on the second stage of House of Lords reform made its report (not to the people, but to "the Queen's most excellent majesty") on 20 January 2000. It recommended that the present legislators-for-life remain until they die. And it recommended very little to complete the democratisation of the British legislature.

The government's white paper
The Commission's recommendations
The Commission in action
The Centre for Citizenship's evidence (A pdf version is here)
The National Secular Society's evidence
The government's White Paper.
The Bill to expell the hereditary legislators.
The Appointments Commission

The Long Goodbye

"I've nothing against reform provided it leads to better attendance, especially after the dinner hour. It could be more democratic - ghastly overused word - but you'd lose some incredible characters who give their service for the good of the country. You'd lose all their knowledge on land use, forestry, fishing and sporting matters - and one or two have, um, been in industry. I loathe politics and there's a great danger the House (of Lords) will become an awful political place like the House of Commons."
Lord Kintore, a British legislator quoted in the Guardian, October 1998 on the proposal to end the hereditary right of "Lords" to a seat in the legislature

The majority of Britain's hereditary legislators, over 1100 in number, had to leave parliament for good on 11 November 1999. The House of Lords Reform Bill had been approved by the queen.

The Government bill to remove 759 hereditary legislators-for-life from the British parliament was published on 20 January 1999. Those who would lose their privileged place in government included five members of the "royal" family: one "prince" and four "dukes." However, the government accepted an amendment to the bill to allow 92 hereditary legislators to continue in office until 2002 to persuade the "Lords" to co-operate with the passage of the legislation. And all hereditary "Lords" will still be recognised as superior beings, keeping their titles and their "degrees of rank and precedence."

In the last debate before the so-called lords left the legislature the leader of the Conservative group, "Lord" Strathclyde, declared that those responsible should feel "embarrassment and shame."

The House is now composed largely of those lords who did not inherit their title and cannot pass it on to the next generation, an innovation from 1958. And 92 hereditary lords who have been reprieved until the next stage of reform, in a compromise agreed by the government to ease the passage of its bill.

As if to confirm that the arrogance of their lordships has not diminished, following the enactment of the bill the Conservative leader in the Lords threatened that the un-elected legislators would now use their powers "with a ruthlessness (not) seen before."

This historic challenge must not be fudged

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