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9.14 pm
Mr. Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury): I pay tribute to the work that went into producing the report, although I regret the fact that it was necessary. I regret that this debate is necessary, despite the excellent speeches that have been made from both sides of the House.
The Government have a record of leaving a constitutional mess. With devolution, we still have the West Lothian problem, with which we have to wrestle to try to recreate the fairness and balance that used to exist in the constitution. We are also wrestling here to find a solution to a problem that need never have existed. When we voted on whether to retain 91 peers in the ridiculous mishmash House of Lords that we now have, I voted against that and would do so again. In an ideal world, we would not start from here, but the fact that the House of Lords and the constitution of this country have been
around for such a long time makes them different from the constitutions in other countries. Therefore, direct comparisons with, for example, the USA are not really relevant.The House of Lords has many strengths that have perhaps not been brought out in the debate. The independence of mind of many of the peers, although they sit technically as Conservative or Labour, has often been demonstrated by the fact that they have voted against measures put forward by this Government and by the previous Conservative Government.
Mr. Love: Can the hon. Gentleman explain why Members of the House of Lords are so much more independent under a Labour Government than under a Conservative Government?
Mr. Robertson: I do not think that that is the case, but I shall not try to explain why because I am short of time.
As I said, the House of Lords has many strengths. I am sure that hon. Members listen to, and read the reports of, debates in the House of Lords, the quality of which is sometimes superior to the quality of debate in this House. We should not discard that strength.
People might ask how I can justify the continuance of a House of Lords that is not democratically elected, if I believe in democracy. I can do so because, as has already been pointed out, the House of Lords has virtually no powers. It can delay legislation and send it back here to ask us to think again, but at the end of the day it can do no more. Therefore, I do not mind that it is not elected, so long as--as my hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) said--the whole parliamentary package is democratic. Ultimately, the democratic will of this House is always supreme, which is why I can accept an undemocratic House of Lords.
What are we trying to achieve when we talk about democracy? Electing people is democratic, but do we represent the views held across the country? I sometimes wonder whether this House achieves that. Many views are held in Labour constituencies that are not represented by the elected Members for those seats. The House of Lords, in its present form and perhaps in an evolved form, can provide a greater representation of some of the wider views found in the country.
What would we achieve by having a second elected Chamber? Lord Wakeham is a former Conservative Chief Whip and at a meeting I attended, he expressed concern about the whipping arrangements in Parliament. He did not want to reproduce in the House of Lords the whipping arrangements that prevail in the House of Commons, and we should not let that point pass without serious consideration.
If we had now a House of Lords dominated by elected Labour Members who were whipped as such, where would be the check on the Labour Executive in this House? It would not exist. Alternatively, if we had a Conservative-controlled House of Lords of elected Members who wanted to show their strength, we could have gridlock. I do not accept that the Parliament Acts would be safe in such circumstances. Rather, we would leave ourselves vulnerable to the discussions in smoke-filled rooms between certain senior Members of
this House and certain senior Members of the House of Lords. Where would we have gone? What would we have achieved?As time is short, I will finish by making a suggestion. For all its faults, I suggest that we continue with an appointed House of Lords. I am concerned about how those appointments would be made. I am concerned about quotas and would seriously object to them, although I would want to see every opinion in the UK represented. I would balance that by bringing in, on an elected basis, people from organisations; the heads of Churches, charities, employers' organisations and trade unions could provide a balance that might then restrict the powers of the people who would make the appointments.
It is not an easy question to answer. Speaking as someone who will never inherit anything, I think that we should have carried on with what we had. There is an argument for that, but we must now look forward.
9.21 pm
Mr. Gerald Howarth (Aldershot): I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Tewkesbury (Mr. Robertson) for curtailing his remarks to allow me to speak. He asked what had been achieved by the Government's emasculation of the other place. The answer is absolutely nothing, except mayhem and confusion all over the country.
The institution may have been unique, and possibly eccentric, but it nevertheless commanded respect across the country. It was a repository of a great deal of wisdom and it knew its place. It could only go so far in challenging the principal democratic authority in this country--namely, this House.
That was all torn up by the Prime Minister in the name of so-called modernisation. The Prime Minister is guilty of an act of vandalism and the country will ultimately pass that verdict upon him. He will go down not as a great reforming Prime Minister, but as a man wholly without principle and vision. It is regrettable that, in the name of modernisation, the destruction of one of our institutions has taken place.
I am sorry that I have not participated in the whole debate, but I have been here for a good deal of it. The one feature of the debate has been that there is no consensus on an alternative. There have been all sorts of views expressed, but no consensus. That is why it was so irresponsible of the Government to introduce the measure that removed so many of the hereditary peers from the other place without putting something else in their place.
There is not going to be a consensus on the way forward. There will be no national coming together, despite what the hon. Member for Cannock Chase (Tony Wright) said. There will be no coherent, agreed view on the way forward for the second Chamber. There is no enthusiasm in this country for unicameralism, and people do not believe that this House should be the only authority in the land. However, people are increasingly alarmed at the way in which the Government are trying to ram their policies through both Houses--here, where they are heavily whipped, and in the other place, which the Government are packing with large numbers of the Prime Minister's friends.
Mr. Paterson: Does my hon. Friend realise how bad the Prime Minister's friends are at turning up to the House
of Lords? We heard earlier about young hereditary peers not turning up. Many of the most famous cronies such as Lord Bragg are bad attenders; Lord Bragg missed half of the possible votes in 1997-98. Lord Simpson voted six times out of 157 opportunities, and Lord Sainsbury 38 times out of 161. How can friends of the Prime Minister be imposed as legislators if they do not turn up?
Mr. Howarth: My hon. Friend makes an extremely important point, but friends of the Prime Minister merely follow his example. After all, he never turns up to vote in this place.
Mr. Savidge: Has the hon. Gentleman also noticed how bad Lord Ashcroft is at turning up in this country?
Mr. Howarth: I had not noticed that, as my noble Friend is available more or less whenever I want a meeting with him--and, sad to say, I do not have millions to contribute to the coffers.
There is no consensus on the future. The key question is whether members of the second Chamber should be elected or appointed. My hon. Friend the Member for Chichester (Mr. Tyrie) advanced the case for election extremely effectively, although he did not persuade me entirely. However, people who think that a wholly elected upper House would not wish to arrogate to itself powers enabling it to challenge this House are living in cloud cuckoo land.
Regardless of the electoral arrangements, Members of the second Chamber will be elected by the same people who elect us. They will therefore claim an electoral authority and a mandate, just as we claim the mandate here. The existence of legislation to limit their powers and ability to challenge this House will not dampen their ardour for greater powers that will put them on a par with us. The result will be gridlock.
The hon. Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Savidge) suggested having voting and non-voting Members of the other House. The hon. Member for Basildon (Angela Smith) suggested that some should be elected and others not--a proposition also advanced by the hon. Member for Aberdeen, North.
The Wakeham report proposes that representatives in the second Chamber should be drawn from various regions of the United Kingdom, but states that that would not result in a federal Parliament. That seems to be a contradiction.
In believing that an elected second Chamber would want to challenge this House, I am conscious also that the proposal for an appointments commission is seriously flawed. The hon. Member for Aberdeen, North said that the very good and the very great will appoint the good and the great. That memorable expression will probably survive, and it is an accurate representation of what would happen.
The right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) said that the commission should be restricted when it came to the sorts of people whom it should appoint. He said that it should take note of ethnic, gender and religious balance so that everyone would be represented. Such a huge prescription would be impossible to fulfil, and the result would be a complete farce. I do not believe that the appointments commission will work.
Ultimately, some form of appointment may be the only answer but, like my hon. Friend the Member for Tewkesbury (Mr. Robertson), I can see that it might be appropriate to have as Members of the second Chamber people who represent a particular walk of life or activity. Conservative Members are very much taken with the idea that members of the Women's Institute might prove a formidable voice in the other place, as of right.
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