House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 9th July 2025 Lords Chamber

This system, in which Ministers are expected to rush here to get their £371, is ridiculous. How can this work for Foreign Office Ministers—such as the noble Baroness, who may be doing important work overseas and is completely unpaid, as in the last Government with the noble Lord, Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon—or Defence Ministers? It is completely unacceptable and is yet another example of how the other place shows a lack of respect for this place in how it receives and considers our amendments, and how it treats our Ministers and people in Parliament. I hope that the Leader will be able to persuade her colleagues to find a way of finally sorting this out, so that people can see that this House is respected and treated properly.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)]

My Lords, as probably the most recently retired unpaid Minister, I acknowledge the shop stewarding role of the noble Lords, Lord True and Lord Forsyth. Clearly, they raise an issue of principle. As they have set out, the issue is around a Prime Minister’s management of MPs in the Commons and both Acts of 1975. Although I do not think this amendment is really appropriate in this Bill, it is a substantive issue and it is clearly unacceptable that Ministers of the Crown are unpaid. It reduces the talent pool from which to choose, and it has a flavour of cricket 50 years ago and gentlefolk amateurs. That is quite unfair, but it gives a flavour of those compared with professional politicians.

How can this be solved? Of course, Prime Ministers could exercise rather more restraint over the number of Commons Ministers who are appointed—good luck with that. As the noble Lord, Lord True, said, we could also bring forward a little Bill to increase the number of paid Ministers allowed. I cannot believe—and the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, put his finger on it—that a Government would ever increase the number of paid Ministers in the febrile atmosphere in which we currently operate.

It is worth acknowledging that the inflation has gone down a bit. Research from the Library shows that in 2010, the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, had 118 Ministers, which, by my reckoning, means at least nine were unpaid. The noble Baroness, Lady May, had a similar figure in 2015. Mr Johnson had nine unpaid in December 2019, according to a Parliamentary Answer. My figures show that Mr Sunak increased it to 17 unpaid Ministers, 15 of whom were in your Lordships’ House.

Frankly, I am very dubious that we will see any improvement until we come back to the fundamental issue of substantive reform of your Lordships’ House. The noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, may shake his head, but the reality is that the Lords is treated in the way that it is because we are not legitimate at the moment. I am afraid that the sorts of amendments from the Lib Dems on an elected House, and even tinkering around in terms of the numbers, is not going to cut the cake until we decide what the role of the second Chamber should be, its powers, how its membership is arrived at and whether Ministers would be appropriate to serve in such a reformed second Chamber.

Finally, the question which noble Lords and all other commentators will never answer is: what are the respective powers and relationships between the Lords and Commons, and how do you resolve differences? Let us get down to the real business and not go ahead with this proposal, which, I am afraid, is for the birds.

[Baroness Lawlor (Con)]

My Lords, I support these amendments because arrangements in a free economy involve an exchange of labour in return for payment. Since time immemorial, we have accepted that the labourer is worthy of his hire. Not only does payment represent a benefit to him for work done, but it reflects the obligations on the employer to meet certain conditions and take certain responsibilities, as it does on him.

In the case of ministerial salaries, as my noble friends have pointed out, this has long been recognised in law, with limits put on the number of Ministers, of course. The Ministers of the Crown Act 1937 regulated the salaries payable to Ministers. As we have heard today, the 1975 Act expanded on that and on the limits on numbers.

Unpaid Ministers in the House of Lords should indeed be entitled to claim parliamentary allowances under the prevailing rules of Parliament, but they are not. As we have heard, many lose out even on the attendance allowance if they are on business abroad. There is good reason to pay people for work expected of them and done. In my view, it is thrice blessed. It blesses he or she who gives their labour, he or she who takes the money and he or she who benefits from the labour.

I am in no doubt that without payment—I speak as a former director of a think tank and an employer—we cannot expect clear responsibilities to be fulfilled without Lords Ministers and the public being clear about the obligations on all Ministers, including those in the Lords. Parliament and the Executive will not be seen to be responsible to their paymasters.

We need to be clear about what the duties are in this Chamber. We know what they are, but the public are not aware of them. We have heard today about the long hours and the serious grind that is put in by Ministers of the Crown. Therefore, it is in my view very important that this work and this contract of employment—for that is what it is, even if it is not stated—should be set out. People should freely see what is expected of Ministers and that they fulfil their duties. It is very good for democracy, for our constitution and for accountability, so I support the amendments. I also echo what was said by my noble friend Lord True, that they can denounce the payment—I add that they could give it to charity—but the principle should be implemented.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord True (Con)]

That was also incorrect; it need not necessarily do that at all. I must say that I was surprised when I heard the strictures from the Liberal Democrat Benches—“We cannot support this because this is a very narrow Bill”. Were those not the Benches that pressed two Divisions on the Bill to redesign the House on a democratic basis? They have the gall to now come forward and say that your Lordships should not ask that our Ministers be paid. The intervention was even more startling having heard the explanation from the Liberal Democrat Benches.

The intervention from the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, who is universally respected in this House, was germane, and I thank him too. I had not realised that he was also on the list of unpaid Ministers, which would have been 10 up until a few weeks ago. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, immediately and skilfully picked up the key point that he made. He said that there is never going to be a Bill that comes along to deal with this. Frankly, as I said, we have had the Employment Rights Bill—

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)]

My Lords, I served as Whip on the Bill in 1999 and I was present for every session. I keep the flame that, one day, we will deal with these issues in a substantive way. I still stick to my point that we will make no progress in this area whatever. I know that the Leader may not agree with me but the idea that a Government would bring forward a Bill to say that we are going to increase the number of paid Ministers is completely naive. That is why, in the end, we should get down to the real business of sorting out what this place should really be for.

[Lord True (Con)]

The noble Lord absolutely makes my point for me. When an opportunity arises, let us put aside all the ardour of this and that, and whether or not we like hereditary Peers. We have a Bill that concerns our House and the better workings of this House. As the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, said, if there is a mischief that might be addressed, let us use this opportunity to address it. The Bill has already been amended. It is not a Bill that is intacta. It is not a Bill that is not going back to the House of Commons.

Under successive Governments, for all the striving of the noble Baroness opposite, the House of Commons has continued, and will continue, to ignore the voice of the House of Lords in respect of our request. If we support my amendment, it will force the House of Commons to consider this point and to consider whether there should be a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work in the House of Lords. It will force the House of Commons to consider whether meritocracy should apply and whether the absence of wealth should not deny one the opportunity to serve one’s country in Parliament. It will force the House of Commons to consider the principle that no one should be prevented from serving their party or this House for the lack of private means. Those are critical principles that should be laid before the House of Commons. This amendment would enable that to be done.

I beg Peers from all sides to stand up for their fellows—perhaps silent fellows—in this House who secretly would like to come forward and serve but, as we have heard from these Benches and the Benches opposite, have to look at their bank balances and say that they cannot. Yes, we can. I beg leave to test the opinion of the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Viscount Thurso (LD)]

My Lords, Amendment 21 is substantially the same amendment that I tabled in Committee and seeks to achieve the same purpose but with one substantive difference, which is in timing. The amendment I tabled in Committee would have come into effect during this Parliament, whereas this amendment would come into effect in the next Parliament. I will explain briefly in a moment why I came to the decision to change that.

The amendment itself is the same, so I will not repeat the explanation, save that it seeks to create term limits of 20 years. I am not hugely hung up on 20 years, 15 years or 25 years. I am concerned with the principle that nobody should have the right to sit in this place for ever. There is obviously a discussion to be had around retirement, which we have had. I listened very carefully to the comments of the Lord Privy Seal in that debate last week, and think that around that the Select Committee will do a good job. However, I am not sure that it will entirely be able to do the job that is required.

The reasons why I have gone for a new timing are, first, that it would be only fair to allow the current Government the freedom to do what they wish during the lifetime of this Parliament and to perhaps make up for some of the more egregious excesses that happened in the last Parliament. It is a little unfair to remove the current system and, as it were, at half-time change all the rules. That was the first reason, which may just be me being a bit overly fair, but I thought that it was. Secondly, if during this Parliament there is further reform, and if the Government are able to take through legislation which gives us a different landscape, this amendment coming into force in the next Parliament could be got rid of or scrapped.

I want to make it clear at the outset that my primary choice would be a democratically constituted House of Lords, which is what I have said in many of our debates and, on and off, in different guises for the best part of 30 years. I took part in the debates in the other place in 2012 and the consideration of the draft legislation and was happy to vote with the majority in the House of Commons for that Bill to achieve a Second Reading. But I recognise that having got that far up to the hill and been marched back down again by our then leader, there is little chance of anything substantive happening. I rather suspect that the Select Committee will do its work and discussions will continue, but that at the end of this Parliament we will not be greatly further forward than we are now.

The amendment is a real longstop in the sense of if we arrive at that situation, and if, as has been pointed out by a number of noble Lords, the electoral results for the next Parliament are somewhat more surprising than they might have been at the last general election. Indeed, one poll I saw showed that what would be the largest party in the House of Commons would have no representation in this House—although there were one or two speeches last week that sounded remarkably like a job application from the Benches across—while the largest party in this House would be the fourth party in the Commons, which is a completely ridiculous situation. My amendment does not solve that in any way, shape or form, but it would put a burr under the saddle and make sure that if we were in that circumstance, the Government of the day would need to do something about it.

My amendment very much ties in with Amendment 23 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Burns, which I hope to speak to briefly later, with one exception which I will leave to that point. However, there is an opportunity in this legislation, which may be the only legislation that would affect no one in your Lordships’ House during this Parliament or any of the operation of this Parliament or fetter the Prime Minister in any way during this Parliament but that, if none of the hoped-for reforms came through, would in the next Parliament take effect and oblige, I rather suspect, some action.

I will say two other things in moving the amendment. The first is in response to the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, and his comments earlier about how function should come before form. I take the diametrically opposite view and always have done, and it was a point that was thrashed out in the Committee of both Houses when we looked at it in 2012. I think the function comes from the form; if you introduce a democratic element, the form will change. That also follows the history of what has happened in the relationship between the two Houses over the years. If you have long discussions about the function, you will end up never changing anything and never changing the form. But, most of all, what I would say is—

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)]

My Lords, I cannot resist intervening. How on earth can one go ahead and say we will elect the House of Lords without looking at the powers the House would have? We have the conventions, which, in essence, are voluntary constraints on what we do. The conventions would not last one second with an elected House. It would be wholly irresponsible to simply go ahead with an elected House without sorting out the powers, and particularly what we do when there is a dispute between the two Houses. Would the courts have to be involved? What other mechanism would you have to decide on? You cannot go for an elected House without sorting that out.

[Viscount Thurso (LD)]

My Lords, one of the great joys of being a chalk stream trout fisherman is to land a fly on top of the fish and watch it take with such vigour. I am very grateful to the noble Lord for having done so. I am not going to engage with him in this debate on my amendment, because it is not part of it, as I did not engage when he made the point earlier. If he would like to meet me in the Bishops’ Bar at any time, I will take him through the detail with the greatest of pleasure.

I say to the Lord Privy Seal that if by any chance she were to make me an offer as generous as that which she made to the noble Lord, Lord Ashton, earlier, she would not have to repeat it and I would grab it with both hands. I genuinely hope that the Government might reflect on this. It has been put to me that this is not necessary because if we get our elected House, we will not need to have this form of term limit. That is absolutely true, but my amendment is not about if we get an elected House; it is about if we do not get an elected House.

Finally, I agreed with the Lord Privy Seal when she said, as she once agreed with me when I said it, that we are here not for our expertise but for our judgment. I do not have vast expertise other than in running hotels and trout fishing, but I think I have good judgment. My judgment is that if we fail to do this at this juncture, we may well end up regretting it and not having the kind of reform that we all really would want to have. I beg to move.