Hereditary Peers’ By-elections

Debate between Lord Cormack and Lord Trefgarne

Monday 7th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

I thank the Lord Speaker. I hope that we should not infer from what the Senior Deputy Speaker has just said that we are going to return on 1 January; I sincerely hope that that will not be the first sitting day.

To be serious, perhaps I may say at the outset that while I welcome this opportunity, I am increasingly convinced that we need to up our act in this Chamber. It is disgraceful that so few Members are allowed to sit in here. It would be very easy to have at least three Peers on this Bench, or to have one on each of certain other Benches. Depriving Members of your Lordships’ House of the opportunity to participate properly in debate is a disgrace and I hope sincerely that those who have charge over these things will look imaginatively at what can be done. Of course we have to remain safe, but nobody can have ultimate safety. We must have a viable Chamber that can hold the Government to account and debate more expeditiously—as it could if more of us were here—the great issues of the day.

I do not oppose this measure but I feel that it would be more sensible to heed what the Lord Speaker has said about the numbers in this House and to delay further by-elections indefinitely—perhaps until a proper and definitive decision has been made on the Grocott Bill. I am sorry not to see my friend the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, in his place. It is very important to underline that the continued participation in this House of any existing life Peer is not and must not be threatened by that Bill. We have valued colleagues and I hope that they will be here for a very long time, but by-elections that sometimes produce more candidates than electors, a point which has often been made, do not enhance the reputation of your Lordships’ House.

We need to look carefully at how we admit Members to your Lordships’ House. Today we have welcomed the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester, and I am only sorry that his supporters had to stand at a distance from him. If ever there is proper social distancing in this House, it is when a new Peer is introduced, so it is farcical that the right reverend Prelate’s two supporting Bishops had to stand on the steps of the Throne. As we begin to introduce new Peers over the next two or three weeks, I hope that there will be a sensible arrangement whereby the supporters are able to support. I hope that they will be able to be robed, but if not, at least the Peer being introduced should be robed and the others should be here. I hope very much that the Lord Speaker will be able to use his considerable persuasive powers to ensure that that happens.

We do believe that too many are coming in, but each one will be courteously and individually welcomed, as is always the case and as it should be. However, we have an underlying problem with numbers, and the sooner that the full House can have another proper debate on the Burns report and on the wise words of our Lord Speaker, the better. I hope sincerely that we will soon reach a stage where, if someone is given a peerage, he or she does not automatically come in immediately. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester came in because he has been waiting for a considerable time. There is a finite limit on the number of Lords Spiritual, at 26, which includes the two archbishops and the right reverend Prelates the Bishops of London, Durham and Winchester. The others have to wait their turn. I believe that we can take an example from that.

I also believe that Prime Ministers should be able to give a peerage without a seat in the House of Lords, because the Prime Minister himself has created an extra problem for your Lordships’ House. All of these things should be looked at together in the round. It would be a good idea if the Lord Speaker asked the noble Lord, Lord Burns, to bring an updated report before your Lordships’ House in order to re-emphasise some of the existing recommendations and perhaps introduce new ones, and for us as a proper House of Lords to debate. The Government should then listen to what the Lords have said.

It is entirely possible for your Lordships’ House to refuse to admit somebody. A peerage has been given but we do not have to sanction immediate entry. There is precedent going back to the reign of Queen Victoria, when she tried to create a life Peer—in 1862, I think. I am not suggesting that we invite a confrontation by doing that immediately, but that in the interests of the House we have to do two things: first, to demonstrate that we are a proper, functioning House—which we are not at the moment—and secondly, to try to ensure a membership that is more in line with the other place.

[Lord Trefgarne (Con)]

My Lords, I will not detain the House for more than a moment. As your Lordships will be well aware, I am not a supporter of the Private Member’s Bill tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, and am sure I never will be, unless circumstances change and House of Lords reform has by then been completed, which was the condition on which the hereditary noble Lords came to this House in 1999. In the meantime, there is room for more than one respectable view on the present circumstances. I do not, therefore, oppose the present proposals but I am not particularly strongly in favour of them.

House of Lords Act 1999 (Amendment) Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Cormack and Lord Trefgarne

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 9th December 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Trefgarne]

My Lords, Amendment 1 appears on the Marshalled List in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Caithness. The reason why my noble friend and I, particularly myself—again, I must not speak for him—have such strong views on the Bill relates to what happened in 1999. At that time the House of Lords Bill, as it then was, came to your Lordships. It had no provision for hereditary Peers’ by-elections or temporary membership at all. It just removed the hereditary Peers in one fell swoop. After a lot of discussion, it was agreed there would be a remaining number of hereditary Peers and they would remain by virtue of the by-elections, which are now the subject of the Bill. To secure that, we had to make it clear that we would have had grave difficulty with the Bill had it not had those changes made to it.

The terms on which those changes were made were confirmed by the then noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor to be “binding in honour” on those who gave their assent to them until such time as House of Lords reform is complete. That was the undertaking given at that time. I agree with those undertakings. When the House of Lords Reform Bill came before Parliament three or four years ago for a largely elected House, I was not opposed to it and would not have sought to object to it, at least not in principle. That is not what happened. That Bill foundered in the other place, as your Lordships will recall. That is why we are very much not in favour of this Bill—in fact, we are wholly opposed to it—because it is piecemeal reform, to which we profoundly disagree.

The number of hereditary Peers was set at 92 back in 1999. It has remained 92 ever since. Since then, the number of life Peers has increased beyond all recognition, but that is another matter. In the meantime, I beg to move the amendment standing in my name on the Order Paper.

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, last Friday we had a debate introduced by the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury that saw this House at its best. On Monday we had a debate on aspects of the future of your Lordships’ House that again saw this House at its best. There is a real danger that this House is going to look absurd today.

We have some 60 amendments. Those who decided to put them down have clearly not agreed to their being grouped. That means we will have debate after debate. And to what purpose? At the end of the Second Reading on 9 September, my noble friend Lady Chisholm of Owlpen made it abundantly plain that this was not a Bill that the Government could support. I personally regretted that. I know the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, regretted it deeply. After all, he was not seeking to remove anyone from your Lordships’ House. He sought to bring to an end a system of by-elections, where we had, just prior to that, had the ludicrous spectacle of three electors choosing from seven candidates—something that could hardly reflect great credit on your Lordships’ House.

This is not an attack on hereditary Peers, many of whom have given staunch and sterling service to your Lordships’ House. Among the Ministers on the Front Bench at the moment—not at this precise moment, although we have one of them—are a number of hereditary Peers who give public service of the highest quality and excellence. Indeed, my noble friend Lord Trefgarne himself has been a distinguished Minister and is at the moment chairman of an important committee. He surely cannot wish this House to look ridiculous.

There is a case for saying that what was agreed in 1999 should remain. I accept that it is a strong case. I believe that there are things that could be done to make it less absurd. For instance, if a retiring or deceased Peer had been an officer of the House, everyone could have a vote. We could turn the House into an electoral college or, more sensibly perhaps, all the Members of the various groups, be they Cross Bench, Labour, Liberal Democrat or Conservative, could vote for vacancies. At least then you would have a three-figure electorate. To approach it in the way being suggested this morning can do nothing other than risk making this House look ridiculous. There is a real debate to be had and there are real points that can be made, but some of the amendments down today would certainly qualify for a parliamentary entry in Trivial Pursuit.

I do not intend to detain your Lordships long, but I urge the House to have a mind to its reputation. We are concerned about that. Those of us who believe passionately in the role of this House, as many of us tried to spell out on Monday of this week, do not wish to see our reputation trashed, least of all trashed from within. I hope that we can come to a reasonably speedy conclusion today.

House of Lords (Amendment) Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Cormack and Lord Trefgarne

Thursday 1st March 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack]

It could be a redacted version.

[Lord Trefgarne]

You could scratch out the names.

House of Lords Reform Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Cormack and Lord Trefgarne

Friday 21st October 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Trefgarne]

My Lords, we are anticipating that the main Bill, subject to the scrutiny by the Joint Select Committee, will somehow not succeed. I do not agree with that.

[Lord Cormack]

We are anticipating no such thing. Some of us hope that these proposals will come to naught. Others wish them to succeed. At the moment, none of us knows. Although the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, and I take diametrically opposed views on the composition of a future House, we both recognise that there are certain urgent housekeeping duties that should be put into effect in this present House. That is all that my noble friend Lord Steel is seeking to do. To delay it until after the next general election would be an absolute nonsense. We would either then be having the first elections, or we would have nearly another four years of the imperfections which we are currently seeking to put right.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Trefgarne]

My Lords, like my noble friend I am in some confusion and difficulty. We have nine clauses left to consider. There are a number of amendments to all those clauses. Some of them were tabled by my noble friend Lord Caithness, some by me and some by other noble Lords. Would it not be better to adjourn the Committee now and find another comparatively short occasion on which we could complete the Committee stage and thereafter proceed to Report stage in the normal manner? I am not trying to squash my noble friend’s Bill. That is not for me to do; that is for your Lordships to decide. I am asking that it be considered in a proper and orderly manner. At the moment we are not doing that. I beg to move.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, it will be considered in an orderly manner on Report and we will have the benefit of having concluded the Committee stage. That is the crucial point before the House. Then we will have proceeded in an orderly, tidy and satisfactory manner. We will have silenced no one, anticipated no one and pre-empted no one, and we will have reflected credit on the House rather than otherwise. I hope that, as his noble friend Lord Caithness has taken the line that he has over Report stage, my noble friend will feel moved to do likewise.