Tag Archives: lords reform

Robin McGhee

Opinion: Why is Nick Clegg being quite so wrong on Lords reform?

By Robin McGhee | Tue 27th December 2011 - 2:50 pm

If there is one thing taken for granted amongst Lib Dems it is that the House of Lords needs radical reform. In fact, most Lib Dems would go further than that. Like Cromwell, they would abolish the Lords outright, to be replaced with a Senate or not at all. But there are a substantial minority who, like me, think this is the wrong approach.

In an otherwise excellent speech before Christmas Nick Clegg set out his stall as a fervent abolitionist. He used the rhetoric of Lloyd George to express his purported frustration with the, er, hereditary system which was …

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Mark Pack

Clegg: we will use Parliament Act to ensure Lords is reformed

By Mark Pack | Mon 19th December 2011 - 8:55 am

In a speech to the Demos think tank today, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg will use some particularly robust language about seeing through House of Lords reform:

There is a typical Westminster village cynicism that Lords reform is never going to happen because it has not happened in 100 years. I have no doubt that the opponents in the House of Lords will use every wily trick in the trade to circumvent what is a perfectly normal and long overdue change to a legislature that is not transparent and not democratically accountable to the people…

There should be no doubt about

…

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Mark Pack

House of Lords reform: the next steps

By Mark Pack | Sat 24th September 2011 - 9:55 am

As I mentioned when blogging Ming Campbell’s speech from Liberal Democrat conference, the motion in favour of Lords reform was passed overwhelmingly.

That in itself was not a surprise, but that does not mean actually securing Lords reform will be easy. Two immediate ways you can support the campaign for House of Lords reform are:

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Mark Pack

Ming Campbell urges Lib Dem peers to back Lords reforms

By Mark Pack | Fri 23rd September 2011 - 10:55 am

One of the speakers in the Lords reform debate at Liberal Democrat conference was former party leader Ming Campbell, who not only backed the plans for elections to a reformed upper house but also directly addressed the Lib Dem peers who have been talking of opposing the introduction of elections:

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NewsHound

LibLink: Mark Pack – Some party rebellions are good for the leader

By NewsHound | Sun 18th September 2011 - 2:34 pm

The Voice’s Mark Pack has been guesting over at the New Statesman again, this time pointing out how there are some party rebels Nick Clegg may rather welcome:

Political pundits go on endlessly about how leaders should have “Clause 4 moments” when they pick a fight with parts of their own parties. In this case, the reluctant have handily offered themselves up in opposition to Nick Clegg and democrats, providing an easy route for the Deputy Prime Minister to garner the benefits of a Clause 4 moment without its usual pains.

You can read Mark’s post about Lib Dem conference …

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Mark Pack

Have you taken part in the House of Lords reform consultation yet?

By Mark Pack | Fri 16th September 2011 - 8:55 am

Aside from the debate at Liberal Democrat conference on Lords reform, there’s another important opportunity to have your say on Lords reform at the moment. The official public consultation from the Joint Committee of the Draft House of Lords Reform Bill runs until 12 October and Unlock Democracy have put together a very simple to use website that steps you through responding to the consultation quickly and effectively.

So do make a visit to http://action.unlockdemocracy.org.uk/page/s/lords-reform-consultation and make sure your views go in before 12 October.

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Dinti Batstone

Opinion: “I don’t like them, you don’t like them… We have to have them”

By Dinti Batstone | Wed 14th September 2011 - 9:25 am

This Saturday, Conference has the opportunity to show that Liberal Democrats are genuinely committed to achieving gender balance in our own distinctively liberal and democratic way.

Conference will debate an amendment which Jo Shaw and I have put forward to Mark Pack and Paul Tyler’s Lords reform motion. Our amendment builds on the approach taken by our party in the late 1990s, when one-off zipping was used to deliver a gender-balanced cohort of Lib Dem MEPs in the first PR elections to the European Parliament.

In an ideal world we wouldn’t need these kinds of measures. But with just 12% women …

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Posted in Conference and Op-eds | Also tagged , , , , , , , , and | 14 Comments
Mark Valladares

House of Lords Reform: the Joint Select Committee calls for evidence

By Mark Valladares | Fri 15th July 2011 - 1:41 pm

Whilst the News of the World scandal has drawn virtually all of the attention, the clock has started ticking on the work of the Joint Select Committee on the Draft House of Lords Reform Bill. Comprising twenty six members appointed from both the House of Commons and the House of Lords, it is charged with considering the draft Bill and reporting by 29 February 2012.

At its first meeting, which took place on Monday, such decisions as how often it would meet were discussed, but the key decision was to proceed with a Call for Evidence. This represents your …

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Paul Walter

DPMQs: “Grotesque” and “beneath contempt” – Clegg on the Milly Dowler phone hacking allegations

By Paul Walter | Tue 5th July 2011 - 8:45 pm

The highest profile issue at Deputy Prime Minister’s questions today was the issue of press phone hacking in the light of the allegations concerning Milly Dowler and the News of the World.

Harriet Harman asked Nick Clegg to back Ed Miliband’s call for a general public inquiry into illegality in the newspaper industry. As someone has said, this is a bit like holding an inquiry into why we get bad weather. In a sign of divisions within Labour, Chris Bryant, in contrast, has called for a more narrow inquiry.

Nick Clegg stopped short of backing an inquiry but, instead, emphasised the importance …

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Posted in Parliament | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , and | 29 Comments
Nick T

LibLink: Lord Tyler – Restore teeth to the Lords

By Nick T | Tue 5th July 2011 - 5:21 pm

Lib Dem peer Lord (Paul) Tyler recently took to the Guardian’s Comment Is Free along with Labour’s Lord (Andrew) Adonis with a joint piece arguing that their fellow members of the House of Lords should back proposals to reform the second chamber.

Here’s a sample:

Any objection that reform is taking place with undue haste will not stand up to scrutiny. It is now 100 years since the passage of the Parliament Act, which states the intention to substitute the Lords with “a second chamber constituted on a popular instead of hereditary basis, but such substitution cannot be immediately brought into operation”.

…

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Paul Tyler

Lord Tyler writes: Don’t listen to the doomsayers

By Paul Tyler | Fri 1st July 2011 - 10:53 am

Since the publication of the Government’s White Paper and Draft Bill on House of Lords reform, the old guard have lined up to cavil about its detail, to deride its democratic principles and to defend – in the last ditch – the status quo.

This has augmented the popular media’s predisposition towards arch cynicism and trenchant pessimism. Yet there is firm evidence to contradict their lazy assumptions. Just because Labour engaged in over a decade of dither and delay does not mean that a determined government, with the resolve of the House of Commons behind it, cannot succeed.

The …

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Nick T

LibLink: Chris Rennard – A fox in the House of Lords

By Nick T | Tue 28th June 2011 - 4:24 pm

Lords of the Blog has a new contributor: Lord (Chris) Rennard, Lib Dem peer and former chief executive of the party. And in his maiden post, Lord Rennard explains why, even after having sat in the place since 1999, he still feels passionately about the necessity for the second chamber’s reform.

Here’s an excerpt:

New visitors to the House usually meet me at Peers’ entrance and often ask fairly quickly about Lords reform.  I point immediately to the progress made since I became a peer in 1999.  I proudly show them my coat peg in the cloakroom and explain that it

…

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The Voice

“Speaking rights only” for unelected peers – Hames

By The Voice | Tue 28th June 2011 - 12:27 pm

Another barnstorming speech on Lords reform, this time by Duncan Hames MP in last night’s Commons debate.

Duncan reiterates the suggestion he made earlier in the debate, that unelected peers should have speaking rights only:

Does the right hon. Gentleman think that bishops voting in the House of Lords adds in any way to the expertise they are able to offer through what they say in that Chamber, and might they find it easier to remain in that Chamber if they were to desist from taking part in Divisions?

The speech in full:

It is a privilege to follow Rory Stewart, not

…

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Posted in News, Parliament and Speeches | Also tagged , , and | 4 Comments
Mark Pack

Conservative peer wishes for return to rule by hereditary peers

By Mark Pack | Fri 24th June 2011 - 12:24 pm

It appears Baroness D’Souza has a rival in the competition for the most implausibly anti-democratic statement by a member of the House of Lords seeking to argue against them having to win any votes in order to rule over us.

Her rival is Conservative peer Baroness Hooper not only said that the 1999 reforms, which including removing several hundred hereditary peers from the Lords, had not improved the Lords but also that she wished we could return to the having hundreds of hereditaries:

As far as I am concerned, the post-1999 House of Lords is no better, no more democratic … If

…

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Mark Pack

Baroness D’Souza gives us an unusual definition of democracy

By Mark Pack | Wed 22nd June 2011 - 8:10 pm

It’s been a staple argument of despots and dictators for decades, even centuries. They’re not undemocratic you see. They’re actually far more democratic than those decadent people who rely on elections. Because democracy isn’t about elections after all, is it?

Such arguments, even when dressed up by sticking the word “democracy” into a country’s name, have rightly and widely been given short shrift. You’d have thought, therefore, that arguing that democracy doesn’t require elections would be an argument a Parliamentarian these days might steer clear of.

But no.

Step forward Baroness D’Souza:

I do not believe that elections are the only form of

…

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Helen Duffett

“It was a virtuoso performance” – Viscount Astor on Lord Ashdown on Lords reform

By Helen Duffett | Tue 21st June 2011 - 11:17 pm

Reading tonight’s Lords Hansard at bedtime (as you do), I’ve just found Paddy Ashdown’s speech from this evening’s debate on the House of Lords Reform Draft Bill.

Viscount Astor (Conservative), who spoke next, said:

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, has just given a speech that I am sure will be used by every Liberal Democrat candidate who wishes to stand at an election to this House in the future. It was a virtuoso performance. I am afraid that my contribution will be somewhat more modest.

If you do wish to stand at a future election to the House of Lords, I’m reproducing Paddy’s speech below so you can get memorising right away.

What did Baroness Boothroyd say that Paddy found so bloodcurdling? Why would he happily exchange wisdom for legitimacy? How would history have been affected if the House of Lords had been constructed differently?

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Stephen Tall

“Delivering this is going to be very difficult” – Tory peer Strathclyde’s verdict on Lords reform

By Stephen Tall | Sat 18th June 2011 - 6:10 pm

Let’s start with the good news — Lord Strathclyde, the Tory leader in the Lords is a self-styled “long-term supporter” of reform of the Upper House. Now for the bad news — he’s pessimistic that the Coalition will actualy deliver elected senators by 2015, the deadline set by deputy prime minister Nick Clegg.

Here’s what m’Lord Strathclyde (who inherited a seat from his grandfather at the age of 25) has to say in an interview in today’s Financial Times:

“To me the dream scenario would be . . . getting in place by the end of the next session and then going forward

…

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Mark Pack

Grassroots Liberal Democrat campaign for Lords reform launched

By Mark Pack | Tue 14th June 2011 - 7:22 am

From a news release sent out by, er…, me and as featured on page two of this week’s Liberal Democrat News:

The number of Liberal Democrat peers opposing the government’s plans for elections to the House of Lords has triggered the creation of a new campaign group by grassroots activists who back the introduction of elections.

“Liberal Democrats for Lords Reform” is campaigning for Liberal Democrat peers to stick to the party’s long-standing policy of an elected Upper House.

“We’ve already been waiting over 100 years for Lords reform to be completed. It’s absurd that in the 21st century you can get

…

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Nick T

LibLink: Mark Pack – Lords reform: three tests for three party leaders

By Nick T | Sun 12th June 2011 - 8:57 am

Over on the Total Politics website, Mark Pack has a piece looking at what the coalition’s plans for reforming the House of Lords means for each of the three party leaders:

For each of them Lords reform offers both an opportunity and a threat. For David Cameron the opportunity is to push on with his mission to change the Conservative Party, modernising it in a continuing effort to shed the problems that have resulted in nearly 20 years passing since it last won an overall majority. Many in the Conservative Party, especially in the Lords, are opposed to the introduction of

…

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Mark Pack

How do you pick an expert? The flawed argument against Lords reform

By Mark Pack | Wed 8th June 2011 - 8:43 am

You need an expert. What do you do? There are plenty of different ways of going about finding one, I’m sure.

But I bet you don’t dig out the books from 20 years ago, look who was an expert back then, place the names in the hat and then pick out a name or two at random.

That, however, is how the House of Lords works – and that’s why I am unconvinced by those who argue that democracy has no place in one half of Parliament because ‘we need experts’.

Certainly there are some experts in the Lords. Just as there are …

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Mark Pack

Lords reform: the Liberal Democrat trio announced

By Mark Pack | Mon 6th June 2011 - 7:23 am

Over the weekend Mark Valladares blogged about the three Liberal Democrats being appointed to the Joint Committee of both Houses of Parliament carrying out pre-legislative scrutiny committee on Lords reform:

From the Lords, representing the constitutional wonk tendency (in a good way), Lord Tyler is the first of the two nominees. Paul has been leading calls for a complete overhaul of the Second Chamber for a very long time and is one of the Party’s foremost constitutional experts…

From the Commons, that rather unusual beast, a former member of the House of Lords, John Thurso. As he has already been abolished once,

…

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Nick T

LibLink: James Graham – Liberal – but not so democratic in the Lords

By Nick T | Thu 2nd June 2011 - 3:25 pm

Over on the Guardian’s Comment Is Free site, Lib Dem blogger James Graham has a piece arguing that if the party wants to demonstrate its commitment to reforming the House of Lords, we should start by stopping the appointment of additional peers.

Here’s a sample:

Nowhere are the flaws of political appointment more apparent than in the Liberal Democrat party in the House of Lords. Not only are Lib Dem peers handpicked by their leader (in theory, the leader is restricted in his choice; the reality is somewhat different), they are self-selecting. You are either

…

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Mark Pack

In which I praise two Labour bloggers…

By Mark Pack | Thu 2nd June 2011 - 7:24 am

Given I’ve spoken before about the importance of a broad cross-party coalition to back Lords reform, it’s only right that I compliment two Labour bloggers who have spoken up on the topic in the last few days.

Luke Akehurst over on Progressonline wrote,

Labour’s constitutional conservatives are gearing up for another rearguard action … Unlike the AV question, when the party outside parliament was as divided as the PLP, the wider Labour party has a clear and settled view on this one. The National Policy Forum, representing all the key party stakeholders, voted at the ‘Warwick II’ meeting in July

…

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Nick T

LibLink: Mark Pack – What should happen to an MP who is voted out of office?

By Nick T | Wed 1st June 2011 - 2:55 pm

Over on Left Foot Forward, The Voice’s Mark Pack has a piece highlighting the common, but outrageously undemocratic, practice of appointing defeated MPs to the House of Lords – just one of the many reasons that the second chamber needs thorough reform. And with those with a vested interest already lining up to oppose any changes, Mark makes the point that it is crucial that a grassroots group of reformers unite behind the finalised proposals, rather than making the mistake of opposing some reform because it is not total reform.

Here’s an excerpt:

I can go to a polling station, vote

…

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Stuart Bonar

Opinion: Anti-reform peers shame our party

By Stuart Bonar | Wed 1st June 2011 - 1:51 pm

I confess. I am usually a bit of a loyalist. I believe the time I invest campaigning for the Liberal Democrats is best spent publicising our good ideas and our opponents’ bad ideas, rather than picking fights with fellow party members. On Lords reform however I feel forced to engage in an internecine war of words with some of our peers.

The Times newspaper recently commissioned a poll of members of the upper house to gauge their views on reform. It’s no surprise of course that our coalition colleagues, the Tories, are dead set against anything as vulgar as democracy creeping ...

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , and | 26 Comments
Mark Pack

Liberal Democrat peers: oh dear

By Mark Pack | Tue 31st May 2011 - 8:58 pm

No point beating about the bush, if you want to find several handful of Liberal Democrat Parliamentarians who I think are wrong just look to the Liberal Democrat benches in the House of Lords where, as today’s news showed, there is a very large minority opposed to introducing elections for the upper house.

Despite Lords reform having been a long-standing Liberal Democrat (and before that both SDP and Liberal Party) policy, despite the party being in a coalition committed to Lords reform (a pretty remarkable opportunity when you consider the Conservative Party’s traditional view), despite Liberal Democrat party leaders having …

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Mark Pack

Lord McNally fully backs reforming the Lords

By Mark Pack | Sun 29th May 2011 - 5:06 pm

There’s been quite a lot of muttering from politicians about now Lords reform, although featuring in the manifestos of all three main parties at the general election, might not quite be needed or quite yet. That’s even included, regrettably, Liberal Democrat ranks in the Lords.

But Tom McNally, Liberal Democrat leader in the Lords, gave those who think 100 years hasn’t been long enough to think about change or that democracy isn’t what Parliament requires, short shrift in the latest Liberal Democrat News:

One hundred years ago the Liberal government committed itself to a second chamber “constituted on a popular basis instead

…

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Rob Blackie

Opinion: Can we campaign on Lords reform?

By Rob Blackie | Mon 23rd May 2011 - 12:27 pm

Let’s face it, Lords reform doesn’t come up on the doorsteps often, however important it is.

But there is one group of people in Britain who Lib Dem Voice readers know, who care deeply about Lords reform. Campaigners for AV, who most of us have spent the last 6 months working with, are overwhelmingly in favour of Lords reform.

So today we can all use Lords reform as a great campaigning opportunity. Simply create a local petition (like this one)  to make sure that your local MP votes for and campaigns for a 100% elected Lords.

Then send this petition to …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged and | 13 Comments
Mark Pack

LibLink: Tyler versus Steel on Lords reform

By Mark Pack | Sun 22nd May 2011 - 2:03 pm

During the week The Guardian ran an exchange between Liberal Democrats Lord Steel and Tyler – the former Liberal Party leader urging the Lib Dems to drop the party’s long-standing policy (and the Liberal Party’s before that) to introduce elections for the Lords, and Tyler responding.

Here’s a sample:

Steel: I am old enough to recall the defeat of Lords reform proposals through getting bogged down in the Commons in a war of attrition led by Michael Foot and Enoch Powell, and I fear the same may happen to these. There is no public clamour for the changes…

Tyler: Westminster is such an

…

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Lord Tom McNally

Tom McNally writes: we must not let the best be the enemy of the good

By Lord Tom McNally | Wed 18th May 2011 - 9:12 am

To get the full flavour of the task facing the Government when contemplating Lords reform can I recommend going to the House of Lords website and calling up the Hansard for 17 May? There you will read an hour of exchanges when Lord Strathclyde (the Leader of the House) repeated the Government statement on House of Lords reform which Nick Clegg had made in the Commons. There was very little support around the House for the Coalition’s vision for reform.

I believe Nick Clegg has done the House of Lords the courtesy of treating the House of Lords like grown-ups. …

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Posted in Op-eds and Parliament | Also tagged and | 11 Comments
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