House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill

Lord Blencathra Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 9th July 2025 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Blencathra]

23A: After Clause 1, insert the following new Clause—
“House of Lords select committee: implementing recommendations(1) Where a select committee of the House of Lords has been established for the purpose of reporting on possible retirement ages for peers, minimum attendance and participation thresholds, and that committee makes recommendations to establish or change—(a) the age at which peers must retire,(b) a minimum attendance requirement, or(c) a participation requirement,a relevant Minister must, within 12 months of the committee reporting, take the action set out in subsection (2).(2) The Secretary of State must, by regulations made by statutory instrument, amend the following Acts, as appropriate, in order to give effect to the recommendations in statute —(a) this Act;(b) the Life Peerage Act 1958;(c) the House of Lords Reform Act 2014.(3) The recommendations in this section include a motion to approve the recommendations of a select committee, including any amendments to this.(4) A statutory instrument containing regulations under this section may not be made unless a draft of the instrument has been laid before, and approved by a resolution of, each House of Parliament.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment seeks to place changes to the composition of the House recommended by any new select committee on a statutory footing.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, despite the late hour, I make no apologies for returning to the subject of implementing any conclusions reached by the new House of Lords Select Committee in considering possible retirement ages, attendance thresholds and participation rates. The excellent announcement of this Select Committee by the Leader last week was welcomed by all sides, and I am certain that it will provide workable solutions. My amendment would ensure that these solutions are delivered into law expeditiously and without the need for new primary legislation.

The Leader said that she hoped the committee would be up and running by October and would probably report by the end of July 2026, but let us say September 2026 to be on the safe side. We all know that our Select Committees excel in what they do, and I am absolutely certain that this committee will have firm recommendations on some sort of retirement regime, possibly around the age of 85 but with various tweaks. It will most likely recommend an attendance threshold of some sort. Attendance is about those Peers who may turn up for fewer than a set threshold of 5%, 10% or 15%, whatever it might be.

Participation rates are far more difficult. Participation will need to tackle the abuse of those who may turn up for 20%, 25% or 50% of the time and then do absolutely nothing or very little. Determining what and how many contributions will be adequate will be very difficult, and the committee may not reach any conclusions or may have various options for this House to consider as a whole.

However, I believe that, by the autumn of 2026, this House will have before it a report with recommendations, which we will debate and possibly amend, so that by the end of 2026 or early 2027, this House will have agreed by a majority a way forward on retirements and attendance, and possibly participation.

I ask my noble friends not to tell the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth of Drumlean, but I may on this occasion be in full agreement with the noble Lord, Lord Newby. If we get attendance, participation and retirements right, we may not need a fancy formula to reduce overall numbers—but that is an aside.

What will the noble Baroness the Leader do with those decisions of this House? She and her noble friend, the noble Baroness, Lady Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent, said in our debates before dinner that we will attempt to use in-house measures—that is, Standing Orders—where we possibly can, and we all agree with that. They also said that we will need to consider the best legislative route for those issues where Standing Orders were not sufficient and legislation would be required. The subtext was that that legislation would be primary.

The noble Baroness would be faced with two options for primary legislation. One is that she could say to the Select Committee, “Thank you very much—very good work. We will now consult on the second stage of Lords reform, maybe consider a partly elected Chamber, possibly with regional elements, and we will add those conclusions to a Bill in due course”. We all know that, if the noble Baroness says that, the whole thing will be kicked into the long grass. The second option is that she could say, “Thank you very much. I will now go to the Parliamentary Business and Legislation Committee and seek approval for a specific Bill to deliver these recommendations”. For noble Lords who are not familiar with the PBL, it is a committee of the most powerful Cabinet business managers who decide which bids from departments get approval for the next stage—that is, putting a Bill team together then briefing the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel, which will draft the Bill. I can tell those noble Lords who have never appeared before it that it can be quite scary at times. It is currently and usually chaired by the Leader of the Commons, with both Chief Whips, the Secretaries of State for Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, the Attorney-General, the Leader of the House and the Minister for the Cabinet Office.

The first question that the committee will ask the Leader will be whether the Bill is a manifesto commitment. Yes. That is a good. Is it short? Yes. That is also good. Can it be easily amended? Yes, because the Lords is much more flexible and can permit a wide range of amendments. The committee will then say, “So, Lord Privy Seal, are you telling us that all this Bill does is put a retirement age and an attendance threshold on Peers, and that they could debate a wide range of amendments in primary legislation?” The noble Baroness, being honest, will say that that could happen. The committee will ask whether there are any votes in it, and the answer will be no, not really.

We all know that the Leader is very able and persuasive, but I suggest that, with possibly just 18 months to go before a general election, she will have no hope whatever of the PBL approving a Bill to implement what our Select Committee decides, at a time when there will inevitably be the annual Home Office criminal justice Christmas tree Bill in the wings, and maybe something on health, employment, immigration and all the other big political issues that will take priority. Does anyone in this House seriously think that any Government would introduce a Bill on changes in the Lords in a King’s Speech in 2027, to be debated in 2028, maybe months or a year before a general election? I simply do not think so. That is why we need my Amendment 23A.

The amendment is self-explanatory. It would simply build in a statutory instrument power enabling the Government to implement any Lords Select Committee recommendations voted through by this House. It would provide that, if this House amends any of the Lords Select Committee recommendations, we can vote that through. It would enable the Government to amend this Bill when it is an Act, the Life Peerages Act 1958 and the House of Lords Reform Act 2014, should that be necessary. I do not know if it will be, but the Public Bill Office thought that we should have the power to do so, just in case it should prove necessary. Of course, amending those Acts is a Henry VIII power, but I do not think that any Government can complain about Henry VIII powers, since all Governments use them excessively in all Bills.

While it may be possible to deal with attendance through Standing Orders, as I think was hinted at earlier, I have not heard any suggestion from any noble Lord that we could invent a retirement or participation regime that we could implement by Standing Orders alone. If that were the case, the Government would have been shouting about it from the rooftops from Committee onwards. It is assumed that these things will require some form of legislation.

Without my simple amendment, we could find ourselves in the ridiculous position of having proposals on which the majority of this House agrees, and with which the Government also agree, but we can only deliver bits of them through standing orders, and have to wait for primary legislation to do the rest—primary legislation that might never come. It will be fascinating to see what reasons the Government use to reject this new clause. It does nothing to undermine the thrust of the Bill. The noble Baroness the Leader introduced the idea of a Lords Select Committee to come up with recommendations. How can the Government possibly reject this simple solution to deliver into law the recommendations of the committee she has proposed? I beg to move.

[Lord Newby (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Lord will not be surprised to know I do not agree with him. We discussed this before and my view, oft repeated, is that we should, wherever we can, proceed without legislation. We can do that with a number of the issues we are debating. As the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, pointed out, the minimum age at which a person can be a Peer was never legislated on—admittedly, it was a bit ago that that was introduced. We need to look at whether it might be possible to introduce a retirement age without fresh legislation. Either way, I do not want to commit to giving the House of Commons the whip hand over what we do about our own rules when we can change those rules ourselves.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Smith of Basildon (Lab)]

That is actually not the point that the noble Baroness made at the time. Many Members of your Lordships’ House make effective contributions, and she should recognise those as well.

I enjoyed the speech from the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra; he is always inventive and engages well on these issues. However, I say to him that I do not recognise the veto that the noble Lord, Lord True, referred to. My reading of the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, is that if a Select Committee makes recommendations:

“The Secretary of State must, by regulations made by statutory instrument, amend the following Acts, as appropriate … to give effect to the recommendations in statute”.


The Government must then lay those regulations. In practical terms, if a Select Committee were to charge the House with something—if it said, “We would like the House to consider the following options”—how on earth do a Government legislate for all the options a Select Committee may recommend? That is what he would have in his—

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

I hope I made it clear in my speech that the House would consider the options. The House would then come up with a firm vote on what they may be, and not give the Government a range of options to legislate on. It would be the decision of the House on the retirement age, the participation rates or the threshold. We would consider the options and end up with firm recommendations.

[Baroness Smith of Basildon (Lab)]

The noble Lord’s amendment is uncertain, because I did not read it like that. It says:

“Where a select committee of the House … has been established for the purpose of reporting on possible retirement ages … and that committee makes recommendations to establish or change”


certain conventions,

“a relevant Minister must, within 12 months of the committee reporting, take the action set out in subsection (2)”.

Therefore, the noble Lord will not be empowering the House; he will undermine the House by removing it as a body from the equation. Even aside from that point, however, I disagree that matters of this importance should merely be considered by the Select Committee through a statutory instrument. I am sure our statutory instruments committee would have quite a bit to say about that power and whether it was relevant at all.

The establishment of a Select Committee is a matter for the House; if the House does not want it, it will not be set up. It seems to me that it is a good way forward for the House to provide a view on these issues. Where we can take things forward more quickly, we will do so. Where we can act prior to legislation, we could do so. Where legislation is required, an agreement from your Lordships’ House makes that a smoother process. I think the amendment before us today is unworkable in practice and risks undermining the very role of this House by trying to bypass the House. It may not be what the noble Lord intended, but it is what his amendment would do. It would bypass the House; what happens in a Select Committee is then enacted by secondary legislation. That would be an extraordinary move and one that this House has never seen before. I ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, in view of the hour and the mood of the House, I intend to be brief. I merely say to the noble Lord, Lord Newby, who said we should pass our own rules where we could, that I agree entirely. My amendment deals with those areas where we cannot pass our own rules.

[Lord Newby (LD)]

Surely the noble Lord’s amendment requires a statutory instrument to cover every single recommendation of the Select Committee.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

Yes, it is one way to guarantee that it happens, but if this House can bring about some of the rules we want through our own Standing Orders, so be it. The legislative power is there; it does not have to be implemented if the House has done it its own way.

It simply comes down to this: are we going to implement the recommendations of the Lords Select Committee that the noble Baroness herself has created, as we may amend them, or are going to hang around hoping we will get a government Bill in due course to do it sometime? I have said before, and I need not repeat it: I simply do not see that happening.

It was rather disingenuous of the noble Baroness to say the amendment is not technically perfect. I am talking about the general concept here of implementing what this House decides through a statutory instrument, and if the amendment is not technically correct, it is a simple—

[Viscount Hailsham (Con)]

Statutory instruments are not amendable; that is to say that this House would not be able to change whatever was in the statutory instrument.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

Of course, my noble friend is right. I was not suggesting that we would wish to amend the statutory instrument. My amendment seeks to say that when this House votes on proposals on retirement, possibly on participation and possibly on attendance, the Government would then be under an obligation to bring forward a statutory instrument to implement those proposals. My noble friend may ask what would happen if the Government did not do what we asked for. In that case, this House would vote it down.

It is nonsense to suspect that a Government will bring forward primary legislation to deal with little things such as the age at which Peers should retire, and how often they must turn up before they will be slung out of this House. I cannot see that being in a Labour election grid for the next election; it is not going to happen. I also disagree with the noble Baroness because, in a normal Bill, these two little things would be statutory instruments. They would be secondary legislation, and the secondary legislation committee would certainly not disapprove of them. These things are important to us, and I am still convinced that my original assertion is right: the only way we will get these changes through, if this House approves them, is to have my innocuous new clause on a statutory instrument. I cannot understand why the Government are opposed to it, and therefore I intend to test the opinion of the House.