Dr Helena McKeown
1. SUMMARY This evidence builds on the evidence
calling for part time members of the House of Lords submitted
by the Programme for Popular Participation in Parliament of which
I am Deputy Chairman. It proposes that each of the 312 seats proposed
by the Government should be job shared by between four and ten
members amounting in total to 2 whole time equivalent, thereby
allowing the House for 80 hours a week throughout the year. Hence
between 1248 and 3120 members would make up 624wte filling 312
seats in a House sitting for 80 hours a week throughout the year.
2. I am Dr. Helena McKeown. I am a medical practitioner
in general practice. I am a social liberal and a member of the
Liberal Democrat Party. I have held various offices in the past
in Salisbury City Council and both in the past and currently in
the British Medical Association and the Transport and Health Study
Group. However this evidence is personal and is unconnected with
any of those offices.
3. I am Deputy Chairman of the Programme for
Popular Participation in Parliament. This small organisation which
seeks to promote part time membership of Parliament has given
evidence to your committee.
4. In that evidence it has asked the committee
to maintain the House of Lords as a House of part time members.
5. It has said that this could be done by creating
a larger number of seats but making them part time or it could
be done by providing for the 312 seats proposed by the Government
to be job shared.
6. It was not appropriate for PPPP as an organisation
to go further than this. It exists only to advocate for the availability
of part-time seats in Parliament and does not have any specific
policy on any other aspect of reform of the House of Lords.
7. However I am submitting personal evidence
suggesting how this might be implemented.
8. PPPP's evidence drew attention to various
options. Those options were intended to stimulate debate as to
how an elected House containing part time members might be constituted
and to point out that it opens a much wider range of options than
a full time House.
9. This evidence contributes to that debate.
10. It is possible to exploit the wide range
of possibilities that part time members open up and to balance
them so as to create a more balanced chamber thereby representing
a wider range of interests and providing diversity of democratic
mandate. I am aware that my Chairman Dr. Stephen Watkins will
be giving evidence to that effect.
11. However I think it is better to have simplicity.
The Government proposals of 240 elected seats, 60 appointed seats
and 12 faith seats meets that requirement for simplicity. I would
simply replace the number of seats with whole time equivalents
so that one seat could be two half time members or five seats
sitting for one day a week.
12. It is possible to have more members elected,
each of them part time, or to have seats jobshared. I think jobshared
seats would be simpler as it does not require complex proxy systems.
13. I would have a House of Lords which sits
for about twice its current number of hours per year, partly by
sitting for longer each day and partly by sitting on Saturdays
and during the recess. To fill 312 seats it would therefore require
624 wte members. If each of these wte is made up of several part
time members then it would be a House that has more members than
at present, not fewer. 312 seats would each be jobshared by 2wte
made up of between four and ten members (ie ranging from 8 hours
to 20 hours per week). Therefore between 1248 and 3120 members
would make up 624wte filling 312 seats in a House sitting for
80 hours a week throughout the year.
12 October 2011
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