Tag Archives: referendum

An Early Election?

Lord Knight 05/05/2011 – 4:50 pm

Today is polling day for national elections in Wales & Scotland, council elections in much of England, the Leicester South by-election, and the Referendum on a new electoral system for the House of Commons. As all the political commentators are saying, it is the first major electoral test of the coalition; and all the parties are frantically trying to downplay their chances so that whatever t […]

Voting using the AV system.

Baroness Murphy 11/02/2011 – 2:45 pm

The death of Lord Strabolgi (pronounced Strabogie) an hereditary peer who sat on the Labour benches, (see Lord N's blog about him)  has triggered a by-election within the House to elect a new hereditary peer. Usually the vote is held within party groups of hereditaries and we appointed ones don't get to vote but this time we will because Lord Strabolgi was a Deputy Speaker. Are you following this […]

Constitutional reform

Lord Norton 06/07/2010 – 2:39 pm

Lord McNally, the Justice Minister, yesterday repeated the statement  - made in the Commons by Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg  - on constitutional reform.  Rather like Nick Clegg, he attracted some critical questions.  This is hardly surprising given the scope of what is proposed.  There will be one Bill covering the equalisation of constituency boundaries, the reduction in the number of MP […]

To Refer or not?

Baroness D'Souza 01/06/2010 – 12:47 pm

The Blog has been strangely silent over the bank holiday week-end - does this suggest that most of you blog only at work or that you are all out and about pursuing hobbies? I mentioned the possibility of a referendum on an elected House of Lords at last week's meeting of Lord Norton's Reform Group. It was roundly turned down,  very courteously as is always the case in Lords dealings, but fir […]

Call that a White Paper?

Lord Norton 15/07/2008 – 9:50 am

The White Paper on Lords reform appears to have been received with indifference, buried away on the inside pages of the broadsheets and treated as a second-order item by BBC News Online.  Even ministers apparently had lost interest before it had even been published.  It is not difficult to see why. As I anticipated, it makes no intellectual case for electing the second chamber and bandies abou […]