I’ve written here on LordsoftheBlog before about ‘ping-pong’. As we approach ‘prorogation’ – the term used to describe the bringing to an end of a parliamentary session, and the short hiatus until the next one – Bills are going back and forth between the two Houses once again. Most particularly, the Government has suffered defeats in the Lords on the Coroners and Justice Bill, and tight votes in the Commons, so we should be on tenterhooks to see if the Lords, or the Government, blinks first. I am less pensive.
The process shows both how powerful the Lords can be, and how impotent it sometimes is. For one thing, crucial votes on this legislation are now likely to happen late in the evening tonight, or possibly on Thursday. Because the Lords is a part-time House (and defenders of the status quo particularly venerate this feature of it), Peers expect to leave tomorrow, not to return until the Queen’s Speech.
The Government is proposing to give itself a new power to hold a “secret inquiry” rather than an inquest into a death. Both Liberal Democrats and Conservatives have opposed the plans so far. Many of the (again, much venerated) Crossbench Peers have hitherto followed suit. So we should win the votes.
BUT – the Government relies on delays in the business, so that Peers give up and go home.
In the Lords we have a “dinner hour”. Very civilised. It’s a time when we stop considering legislation and a short debate (which few attend) occurs on a topical issue. Peers are supposed to have their evening nosh, and then return to debate and vote on the law of the land. However, many do not get past the noshing stage, and simply repair to their beds.
So next time someone says, “but the House of Lords works”, correct them. “The House of Lords works best before dinner”.
Meanwhile, MPs are now so busy with constituency commitments that even if we do succeed in securing further defeats at this end, far too many MPs will be absent tomorrow to have a chance of overturning the Government’s majority in the Commons. So the Government will win on its objections to our amendments by a large majority and the siren voices in both Houses – who very definitely will want to be snugly at home by Thursday evening – will refrain “the elected House must have its way”. It’s a familiar set text wheeled out in the service of executive power and early bedtimes.
The much vaunted ability of the Lords to defeat the Government should be read in this context. All too often, the second opinion from Peers is overridden by one method or another, by the large government majority in the Commons. And the justification given is that the unelected Lords are to be ignored as “illegitimate”.
It’s almost as if we could do with an ELECTED second chamber, without the considerable constituency duties MPs have, to make reasonable changes to legislation and, from time to time, to defeat the government of the day without having its legitimacy called into question.
There’s not much hope now, though, before the General Election. Even if the Government snapped itself out of inertia, my good friend David Howarth tells me that this year only 4 out of 27 Bills got Royal Assent before 6th May. How many of those included in next year’s Queen’s Speech will ever make it on to the Statute Book?
Tomorrow, I hope to be able to give you a quick report on the outcome of this week’s ping-pong…
“the Government relies on delays in the business, so that Peers give up and go home”
Indeed, there was a ‘procedural farce’ in the house on 9th November, contrived by Jack Straw, in respect of the nefarious measures within the Coroners and Justice Bill concerning the proposed ‘Secret Inquiries’.
(More details at the ‘Public Whip’ site, here:
http://tinyurl.com/y8ezqop )
Why are the government so ardent in their efforts to allow ‘secret inquests/inquiries’, under the toothless ‘Inquiries Act 2005’.
It would appear that there is something more to hide (behind), than the cited outstanding inquest case of Azelle Rodney.
Lord Tyler serves to Lord Norton. It’s a cracking shot straight down the centre of the court! How is Norton going to deal with this one!
Chris Nicholson: Quite easily. The situation Lord Tyler describes regarding late sittings make a case not for an elected House but for reform of the procedures of this one. On ‘ping pong’, the Lords can force the Commons to think again and, because of the pressures of getting a Bill through before the session ends, the Government has to take the Lords seriously and concede amendments. On an elected second chamber, it is worth making the point that advocates of election argue that the two chambers would not be co-equal and that the elected first chamber would still be able to get its way.
It is also worth noting that some of the big Bills that have gone through this session have been significantly improved as a result of scrutiny in the Lords. Most of the changes are achieved by the Government conceding the case on the argument and not as a result of a defeat in the division lobbies.
Give me one Noble Lord, fair and just,with open heart and mind. His armour that of the people that he doth protect, his sword that shines light in the darkness so all can see.
Give me my Lord, fair but true and I will stand with him against the gathering hoard. Those treacherous beasts risen by the people then turned, masochists whose only fear is lack of whip, blindly following their master.
Give me my Lord, that I may cry justice and freedom for all and do battle unto that end. And if I should fall in battle for these fair things not a nobler thing shall I have done than to serve my Lord in service to all.
Excellent post !!!
As a wise person once said, “The less people know about how sausages and laws are made, the better they sleep at night…”
As compared to the commons where the Blackberry beeps and the lobby fodder pour in to vote for a timetable motion denying them the opportunity to even debate large sections of a bill? Beep…vote for whatever the their whip commands…beep vote to overturn whatever the lords has changed…by which time its Wednesday evening…beep… permission to go home for the weekend arrives for many without committee duties.
On Lord Norton’s point – if the Lords is to have the same powers as present or – under many of the supposed advocates of election – less power it’s hard to see how things would improve.
An elected second chamber will change nothing as long as the commons has no intention of conceding that the commons only won its primacy because it was the only elected house and can’t expect to retain automatically if that changes.
Croft: The Lords actually works quite well after dinner, since votes are only a small part of parliamentary work. One can achieve a good dialogue with a minister in a small House, where those present have some knowledge of the subject.
I wouldn’t disagree – but I think Lord Tyler makes a fair point that the Lords generally loses it will to oppose the government in late sittings; whether that is due to constitutional considerations, fatigue, lack of pay, an excellent wine list or a combination of all of them I can’t be sure.
With respect Lord Tyler, not a very strong argument. While the part-time nature of the House can be an issue in case like this, by electing it, you still lose all the unelected House’s strengths – expertise, long-term view, honesty of opinion, independence of government.
Electing it to ensure full bums on seats isn’t a priority. Particularly as the Commons is so frequently nearly empty, as MPs will attend to constituency work, or the government will time debates and votes to occur when many Opposition MPs are at conferences or other such gatherings.
Lord Norton’s comments are absolutely correct.
Lords Tyler and Norton and fellow Commenters,
Is not diversity part of the heritage of Lords? Diversity of seating. It is at least arguable that the Archbishop of Canterbury was seated at least twice as an elcted Lord Spiritual and very agruable that he should have been many times. One has the Lords Spiritual, the Law Lords and the hereditary aristocracy have held different paths to the chamber.
In this context it seems proper to point out that the principle of varied means of seating Lords is well established. What then of preserving and amplifiying that heritage? The Lords could perhaps recapture some of their most traditional attributes by using elections. If 900 is too many to be effective in a council perhaps all types of Lords could seat some of their section by election and some by rotation in any given term. This would have the value of also preserving the rights of all hereditaries to some representation in each year.
I have argued before for upper chambers in each of the countries so that the off year Lords could go there if they wished, but the principle would apply without that adaptation. The Lords Spiritual once represented great bodies of scholarship at its best in the realm. Should the Universities have a system of ex-officio representation?
If Lords becomes truly democratic it will be truly absurd. The word absurd is harsh. I mean it most sincerely. But if I were British I would try hard to persuade Lord Norton that elections do not destroy aristocracy.
Thanks for very interesting comments.
However, I really think it is a peculiarly British view that expertise and election are inimical to each other; indeed, in the Commons the best MPs develop expertise by sitting on Select Committees and listening to evidence, meeting various groups, and taking stock over many years. In fact, what the Lords has is a great many people with a professional interest in a particular area. That is ‘interest’ in both senses: they are interested in the subject and they have an interest (or did) in the policy outcome. Their input is welcome, of course, as, say, the view of an ex-teacher is always welcome when you design an education policy – but no one would say ex-teachers should have the last word on education policy, because their view is necessarily dominated by the ‘producer’ interest. Parents and pupils are the consumers. And, in an appointed House, expertise is almost always rapidly outdated: there are plenty of ex-experts here.
Similarly, while you might want that ex-teacher’s view on an education bill – and even allow them a vote – it’s much less clear why they ought also to be herded through the lobbies by party whips on matters over which they have no experience whatever. Why on earth should an ex-teacher get to vote on the Policing and Crime Bill or, for that matter, the Coroners and Justice Bill? This is one of the reasons why we get such low turnouts for Divisions.
Meanwhile, it is entirely possible to have an elected second chamber which is independent of the government because no-one suggests that governments should rely on the second chamber for confidence in their administration; the beauty of it is that a government can be defeated – made to rethink – without it being displaced altogether, as any series of defeats in the Commons would mean. As for honesty of opinion and long-term view, the present proposals for an elected second chamber suggest long, non-renewable terms; with these you retain independence, though some would quite reasonably argue that you also demean accountability. On that one, you sit where you stand: a very accountable house (say with elections every couple of years) would be less likely to buck public opinion; a very independent house (with no elections at all) is totally unaccountable and lacks the legitimacy to stand its ground when the Government is wrong. As I also intimated in my post, an elected second chamber would be quite different from the Commons since its members would not have substantial constituency duties; their job would be to be in the chamber, to scrutinise government and to vote on legislation. And we would not expect that the simple matter of wily governments timing votes in such a way that it is inconvenient for Parliament to defeat the Executive would so easily encourage elected members just to disappear and let the government have its way.
Furthermore, the suggestion that Ministers listen if there is sufficient knowledge, is – on the big ticket issues – over-optimistic. Ministers really only give way if they are of the view that they will lose on Division if the matter is pressed to a vote (which is why it is so frustrating that so many Peers think it’s wrong to persist in voting against Ministers), or if someone can demonstrate that part of a Bill is genuinely unworkable. On matters of principle, as I said in my previous entry, the dismal refrain “the elected house must have its way” invariably wins the day.
One further point! There is really no problem about the primacy of the Commons, if and when the Lords are reformed. It depends what you understand by primacy: “must have its way” is one definition, but not the only one. Primacy of the Commons would be maintained by a) the principle that the Government depends only on it for votes of confidence; b) the leader of the largest party there would continue to be Prime Minister; c) the Parliament Acts would remain in place; d) it would continue to be elected all-at-once, whereas the second chamber would only be elected by thirds. The Senate – as I would call it – would therefore never, as a whole, have a more recent mandate than the Commons. However, the fact of elected Senators would certainly embolden backbench MPs to rebel where they thought their government was losing an argument; at the moment, they can stick a peg on their nose and vote with the Government to overturn the ‘illegitimate’ interference of the unelected House. They might think more carefully if their counterparts benefited from a similar legitimacy.
Since most other bicameral democracies come to these sorts of conclusions, I am at a loss to know why Britain should consider itself so different.
Similarly, while you might want that ex-teacher’s view on an education bill – and even allow them a vote – it’s much less clear why they ought also to be herded through the lobbies by party whips on matters over which they have no experience whatever. Why on earth should an ex-teacher get to vote on the Policing and Crime Bill or, for that matter, the Coroners and Justice Bill? This is one of the reasons why we get such low turnouts for Divisions.
And the same applies to the Lords. Taking your argument to its conclusion, the majority of votes are from people without experience voting on things outside their knowledge, Lords and Commons. It’s worse because in most cases they are immune from the consequences of the failures of their law making. For example, with the commons voting themselves immune from taxation on their expenses.
When you say the advantage is that a defeat in the second house isn’t a defeat of confidence in the government, that is one reasons why the cheap referenda by proxy is even better.
All laws have to get passed those directly affected by the laws. Not the abstract judgement of a small group appointed by patronage with all the problems that brings.
You don’t need long non renewable terms when you have referenda by proxy. It’s irrelevant. Combine that with the right of recall for MPs and the public can deal with the errant and law breakers amongst the political class.
We can abolish the second chamber easily and not lose the control. Saves a lot of cash. Deals with all the problems you have eluded to.
After all, why does a large country need more laws than a small country?
Lord Tyler correctly points out that election and experience are not inimical. He also points out that unelected members may have “professional interests in a particular area”, and may also have an interest in the policy outcome. However, it seems to me that, all safeguards notwithstanding, elected members of either chamber are no more likely to be free of such interests.
Lord Tyler also raises the trickier question of the legitimacy of a non-elected second chamber. The underlying question here is what are the possible sources of legitimacy? Even if the only possible answer in the 21st century is the demos, this is not enough to conclude that every branch of the executive must be elected. Nor, I think, is it enough to conclude that appointments to such offices should only be undertaken by elected representatives. No one can deny the law-making element of the judiciary, but judges are not elected, nor, I think, would many wish them to be.
Having said this, the question of legitimacy is difficult, because by its nature, legitimacy depends on what is seen to be right at a given time.
As I see it, the chief benefit of a non-elected second house, is that its members are not required to get themselves re-elected. That is, they don’t have to spend their efforts in selling themselves to the fickle and self-interested voter. Nor do they have to be the sort of people who would wish to.
Further, I am not even sure that the now partially degraded traditional system of selecting members from historically successful families is all bad. Certainly, it is likely to result in some dogs, but many a pup has been sold in an election too. What people really object to here is privilege that appears not to be earned. However, I suggest that such privilege exists wherever power is found. It is of course best that the club is not wholly exclusive, so that new blood can come in from wider sources.
I am not sure that Lord Tyler’s point about “other bicameral democracies” advances his argument much, most of those, at least those remaining in the Westminster tradition, are federal in nature, are they not?
Hear, hear. My basic argument against an elected second chamber has always been this: “Why would you want more professional politicians in Parliament? Aren’t there enough in the Commons (and the Lords as it currently stands, for that matter)?” No matter how many safeguards there are, the simple fact remains that these people would have to be elected (even if only once), and therefore they would have to make themselves likeable to the many, often in the wrong way. It is the fundamental weakness of democracy that we generally don’t know much about a candidate until they get elected, and I see no reason to replicate that.
“I really think it is a peculiarly British view that expertise and election are inimical to each other”
But how often have you watched intelligent members of all parties who know perfectly well something won’t work and disagree with it suspend their principles as soon as the division bell rings because MPs fear their whips.
You accept without question that the parliament acts remain in place. I can’t see anything in your argument to justify why one elected chamber should be able to overrule another elected chamber within 30 days (money bills) or 1 year (other matters). It’s tough to base your argument on the necessity for the legitimacy of elections if you then turn around and tell the second chamber that just because it’s got a mandate doesn’t mean it should expect to actually use it outside of extreme constraints!
You say ‘They might think more carefully if their counterparts benefited from a similar legitimacy’ Probably so but I think in a five year parliament it will be rather too tempting to just wait 30 days or one year if the other chamber has an opposition majority.
I wasn`t going to post, I really do feel debating our, not quite right, demidemocracy is akin to the Chicken and Egg debate, Unanswerable.
First let me state quite clearly, I hate the divisions, the ranks, the BBC view
http://news.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/img/members_by_party/lords_226.gif
The reds, the blues, a few orange and the larger swathe of grey who are all obviously out eating. The idea of the whips whose job is really to install fear to vote the party line is abhorrent. I really did think in the Lords, whom I`d presumed got the job at least for life, I`d see free voting…but alas no.
I thought, Hereditary Peers yes that`s the way. Educated, experienced and Worldy can`t still be the womanising, gamblers the 60`s portrayed (still somewhat how the working classes see them). They`re bound to see things clearer and free vote, won`t they ?
Why is it everyone I talk to wonders why Politicians say all the right things until they get power, then forget about representing their constituents ? Is it the only constituents they see are the party members ? Do they ever get out here in the real World ?
Of course if Politicians did go and speak to the people, ask them what they wanted, we may get dangerously close to that satanic state of Communism, oh God save us from that.
I fully realise that things have to be looked at closely, by the experts…er ok people who may have been experts 20 years ago. That I wouldn`t of course understand Clause 59 subsection 112 para 4 and 6.And that I cannot be privvy to sensitive information which may or may not be correct.
So shall we the people elect the Lords ? Or shall we let Labour then Tory then Labour until it`s full ? Or shall we stick with the slightly eccentric hereditary peers ?
The answer to the first is no, we`re fed up of people not caring what we say so we don`t vote at all. The second will happen whether we like it or not in order to get majorities. So that leaves the third, now let me think who us poor working classes could turn out of them ? There`s Lord Lucan…er no, Lord Nelson..no he`s past his sell by (could have sworn I saw him sitting ealier in the week), I know Lord Greystoke, now there`s a swinging Lord…er perhaps the wrong phrase given their 60`s image. By the way have they made Michael Heseltine a Lord yet ? .
Anyway the wife says it is nearly time for the short debate.
What we the people want is free voting, for both houses. None of this we`ll sack you if you don`t go along with us, bullying stuff. You didn`t give the MP the job we did. Maybe we should have a protest march to free the “vote”, though I dare say they`d legislate against it.
But if we free the vote, they may argue and bicker about it for months and possibly only pass one piece of legislation a year giving our Police Forces with their declining income a little ray of light. Actually no they wouldn`t be able to catch up then, we`re down to cautions for violence and assaults already…but don`t copy that song you may get 30 years….
Ahhh I hear the Baroness Murphy complaining I`m being loquacious….Time for a short debate. 🙂