House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) (Abolition of By-Elections) Bill [HL]

Viscount Astor Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 13th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Astor (Con)]

My Lords, that is remarkably difficult speech to follow. I always assumed that I was the son of a Conservative politician but, who knows, following a DNA test I could be the son of a Labour politician. For all one knows, after a test, I could come into this Chamber and meet, perhaps, the noble Lord, Lord Snape, and say, “Hello Daddy”.

[Lord Snape]

I would embrace the noble Lord as any father would.

[Viscount Astor]

I am grateful to the noble Lord. Anyway, back to the matter in hand. The case against this Bill is stronger than ever. The fundamental reason why is this Government’s commitment to a constitutional convention, as set out in the party manifesto published prior to the election. It is always worth reminding noble Lords opposite that the hereditary Peers are still here not because of the Conservative Party but because of the Labour Government who introduced that legislation. Following that reform, what did the Labour Government do? They did absolutely nothing. They could have moved on to the second stage, but they did not.

The hereditary Peers were described as the grit in the oyster to remind and force a future Government to come up with proper reform. Proper reform is long overdue, and I am delighted to be that grit, if it brings forward constitutional reform. I understand why noble Lords opposite enjoy this Bill because it is getting rid of an anomaly. There are plenty of anomalies in this House. But what is important is, whatever way we get here, we should all be heard in the same way and all have an equal right to participate.

I could support this Bill if it cut down the over-representation of the Liberal Democrats, introduced a mandatory retirement age or even introduced a statutory appointments commission. But it does not. When the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, comes to sum up, perhaps he can reply to the suggestion from my noble friend Lord Strathclyde. I also find somewhat disquieting the speeches from this side of the House from those who worry that, if we give up by-elections, that will be reform done and dusted and we can all remain here. I really hope that that is not the case. We want proper reform.

Every party manifesto in the last election came forward with proposals for reform. The Labour leadership wanted abolition and the creation of a senate. Even more extraordinarily, Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the Labour Party, wants to hand out peerages to his most left-wing colleagues who actually want total abolition of the second Chamber, and certainly abolition of the House of Lords.

I will not put forward any plans for reform today because there is a debate in a couple of weeks. But it should include cutting numbers and perhaps a broader representation of faiths. But whether this House is elected or appointed, it must represent the four nations of this union, maybe in slightly different ways. One cannot justify a second Chamber that represents only England.

As usual, the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, said that some of us have been here too long, perhaps 40 years. I find that somewhat insulting because I believe that whether you have been here 40 years, four years, four weeks or four minutes, everyone should be heard in the same way and that we all have the right to participate. Criticising those who have been here longer should not be done.

We are at the start of a Session and the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, is lucky to have achieved time for this Bill early on, so we will have plenty of time to debate all the amendments, Report and Third Reading. We will therefore not have the spectacle of what happened last time when the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, moved a closure Motion on my noble friend Lord Strathclyde when he had just moved an amendment.

I urge noble Lords not to be led astray by the dulcet tones of the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, however charming they may be, and look forward to a constitutional convention where we can examine the composition and role of this House as well as look perhaps to boundary reform—a painful subject for noble Lords opposite. I do not welcome this Bill, but I will not block it and I will seek to amend it.

Brexit: Withdrawal Agreement and Political Declaration

Viscount Astor Excerpts

Wednesday 5th December 2018 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Astor (Con)]

My Lords, the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury quoted the King James Bible when he spoke. I offer a quote from a rather different hymn sheet, as it were:

“Welcome to the Hotel California … You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave”.


That Eagles hit from 1976 rather aptly describes the one flaw in the Government’s exit proposal. If you do not have the right to walk away, you are permanently held hostage in any negotiation. I wish we were not here. I voted to stay in the EU.

It is claimed the backstop will not be needed and agreements will be negotiated well before the end date. If that is the case, why is it there? Do any other EU treaties have no exit clause or threaten to break up a country? I think not.

In the last few weeks, we have seen how the Spanish raised the issue of Gibraltar. The French want a permanent right to fish in our waters. Among the 27, there are bound to be others who want to gain something from the negotiations—not necessarily from us, but by holding the negotiations hostage and blocking the agreement. Angela Merkel will not be in power. Junker and Barnier will have moved on. President Macron is hardly flavour of the month in France. Other EU Governments will have been replaced by new Administrations.

Some have claimed that we can just walk away from a treaty. I think not. I leave it to lawyers cleverer than I to deal with that proposition, as I am sure they will.

As we have heard during this debate, the Labour Party, the Lib Dems, the DUP, the SNP and many Conservatives will vote to reject the deal next week in the House of Commons. The Government will be forced to reconsider. A hard Brexit is not the only option. It is reported that the EU will negotiate. It is in its interests to do so. A hard Brexit is bad for the EU and terrible for us.

If the EU agrees for the backstop to be moved from the agreement to the political declaration, I believe the agreement could get through Parliament. The Irish would have to back down, but after all they have the most to lose from a hard Brexit. The Labour Party’s six tests could be met.

There are other solutions; they are more complex and difficult to achieve. As we have heard and read, the Government could assert our rights under the EEA treaty to remain part of the EEA after Brexit, and apply to join EFTA. It would be a kind of Norway-plus. We could remain in the customs union. That could include services, which make up the majority of our GDP. Further negotiations on a Canadian-style deal could continue until the Irish border question is resolved. That probably passes Labour’s six tests as well. We would keep our fishing, which removes the SNP’s block. More importantly, it maintains the integrity of the United Kingdom, which is crucial for the DUP, as we have heard from the noble Lords. We would be outside the common agricultural policy and not subject to the ECJ—a core issue at the start of the negotiations. We would be subject to the EFTA Court for disputes and would have only limited mechanisms to restrict free movement, but that would be a small price to pay for not harming our economy or undermining the union.

It is not a perfect solution and has many disadvantages. I suppose it is a halfway house—Norway-plus—but it might command a parliamentary majority. Those in favour of Brexit would see it as the first stage of perhaps a Canadian-style deal. I am not in favour of another referendum; it would be a last resort and it really would show the collective failure of government and Parliament. However, it would be difficult to argue against a referendum if there is no workable deal—if there is a logjam. Imagine the chaos of the referendum, with a pro-remain Prime Minister leading a largely leave party, and a pro-Brexit leader of the Opposition leading a largely remain party. The result would be utter chaos. We really should avoid that.

There may be other solutions, and I am sure there are better solutions than the ones I have suggested, but we should consider all options. We cannot allow Brexit fatigue to allow us to stumble exhaustedly into a bad outcome. Following the vote in another place next week, I hope the Government will seize the opportunity to go back to the EU and renegotiate the backstop. Doing so would make the deal workable and good for this country and generations going forward.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Viscount Astor Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 31st January 2018 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Astor (Con)]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the powerful speech by the noble Baroness, Lady Boothroyd. In preparing for this debate, I looked up the Hansard debates on joining the European Union in 1972. Two things stood out. First, how few Members of this House spoke then—19, as opposed to 190 today. Secondly, how the warnings from Lord George-Brown, then dismissed as scaremongering, seem to have come true. I am not entirely sure what lessons we must learn from those debates except, perhaps, one. Whatever one says in this House will probably turn out to be true at some point, even if it takes 45 years.

I spoke in this House and campaigned in the referendum in favour of staying in the European Union. We lost the argument. The British people wanted their sovereignty back. We addressed lots of economic arguments and offered a good deal, with substantial reforms, to stay in. It was difficult, if not almost impossible, to explain. We did not deal with the basic concerns about sovereignty—the control which the British people wanted returned from the unelected in Brussels to their elected representatives here in Westminster.

I want to take issue with those who say that the British people did not understand what they were voting for. I think they did; they had a greater understanding than some of their elected representatives. Some were surprised by the result but, after all, the referendum result just reflected the view of a majority of the British people which has been growing for the last decade.

I have never been elected, but I have campaigned in every general election since 1974. I cannot think of a general election result when we won but did not deserve to win, or when we lost but did not deserve to lose. When it comes to politics, the British people usually get it right. As we know from Ken Clarke, you do not have to have read every detail of the EU treaty to be either for or against.

We have 10 days in Committee, as well as Report and Third Reading, where there will be plenty of opportunity for this House to act as it should. If necessary it can revise, or ask the Commons to think again, but not wreck nor block this Bill. There are those who want to destroy the Bill and force a constitutional impasse that might result in the Bill being lost. That would be a disaster for this House. Their outcome, of course, is Brexit denied, but the result would be a constitutional uproar, which would lead either to the reform of this House or, probably, to the abolition of a second Chamber.

I want this Government to get the best deal they can for our future relationship with the EU. Our future is not bleak; it may be different, but we will continue to trade with Europe and with the rest of the world. My noble friend Lord Hill of Oareford was absolutely right when he said yesterday that,

“we must surely place a greater priority on being able to shape our own future than on preserving the status quo”.—[Official Report, 30/1/18; col. 1389.]

Staying in the single market and the customs union for ever would be the worst of both worlds: we would be unable to influence the rules of the single market and unable to negotiate our own free trade agreements. Of course, there are still difficult issues to be dealt with, including Northern Ireland and our relationships with the other devolved Administrations, and, not least, the Henry VIII powers in the Bill.

The process of leaving the European Union is one of unprecedented scale and complexity. As well as giving effect to the will of the people to take back control of our laws, the Government must be able to deliver Brexit while ensuring certainty for people and for businesses. As many noble Lords have said during the debate, we need more clarity from the Government on how they see our future outside the European Union. A chaotic Brexit, without a solid legal foundation, would not be in the national interest. The Government need to be able to adapt the laws we are repatriating to the new situation of being outside the European Union.

While I understand the concerns raised about the scope of the Henry VIII powers, I am concerned that Parliament will not have the time it would need to make all those changes before we leave. I agree, however, that Henry VIII powers should, if possible, be brought in by the affirmative rather than the negative procedure. Perhaps we should not be afraid in this House of rejecting affirmative instruments if we feel they are wrong and that we should ask the other place to think again.

The Government have chosen an extraordinary approach, but these are extraordinary times. We all have the right to hold different views, to argue our case and to persuade others to change their mind, but we should not thwart the will of the people as expressed in the referendum and in the recent general election. It is worth reminding those who complain about the referendum that it was a manifesto commitment by the party that won the subsequent general election, and it was then passed in the House of Commons by a vote of 554 for and only 53 against—a majority by all the main parties except the Scots nats.

This Bill is not about the terms of our exit but about the mechanism of how it will happen. We should not be distracted by debates on the merits or detriments of leaving the European Union. The Government themselves have made a commitment to ensure that Parliament will have the opportunity to consider the deal and approve what they have negotiated. We do not need another referendum, and this Bill is not the place for a referendum clause. As my noble friend Lord Hamilton of Epsom pointed out, if there were to be a referendum, no one could agree when it would happen or what the question would be. But we do need parliamentary scrutiny, and that started yesterday in this House. Therefore, I welcome the Bill and look forward to the subsequent stages of Committee, Report and Third Reading.

House of Lords Reform

Viscount Astor Excerpts

Tuesday 15th September 2015 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Astor (Con)]

My Lords, there has not been one speaker who does not agree that the House of Lords has become too big and needs to reform if it is to survive as a respected revising Chamber. The age-old question is how. There are perfectly respectable arguments for an elected second Chamber, for an appointed Chamber and perhaps even for no second Chamber at all. The recent attempt in the last Parliament, with some elected and some appointed Peers—one could call it the “Clegg plan”—fell through the gap in the middle and was quite rightly rejected by the House of Commons.

We have heard that some would prefer a retirement age and some a limit of service, all with their advantages and disadvantages, which are well understood by your Lordships. There is also the suggestion of only one in when two, or perhaps three, leave, which might take quite a long time to work. What is clear is that reform of this House must now come from this House. It must be acceptable to the main political parties and to the House of Commons. The alternative is probably, one day, abolition by the House of Commons, unless we come up with a solution.

I cannot resist adding my thoughts to those of other noble Lords on a solution. It is somewhat similar to the proposal put forward by my noble friend Lord Jopling. It would involve legislation, but as we know from the experience of the noble Lord, Lord Steel, it is possible to get one’s legislation through—it is a long and tortuous process, but one gets there in the end. I believe that this House should remain appointed. Its role must be to hold the Government to account and to revise, but ultimately the Government must always be able to get their legislation through this Chamber. We must not be able permanently to block legislation; the Government must always get their business through. I believe that the composition should be no more than that of the House of Commons—say, 600 or whatever the House of Commons turns out to be. The Cross Benches should be limited to about 100.

After every general election, the leaders of the political parties in this House shall agree numbers based on the numbers of MPs elected to the House of Commons in their respective parties. They shall then hold a ballot, similar to the ballots conducted by the hereditary Peers, to limit numbers within their respected parties. This way Peers elect themselves; they know best who should continue to serve in this House. Leave it to noble Lords to decide who stays; they know best. It worked for hereditary peers when we had that reform. My noble friend Lord Strathclyde said that it was a painful process, but I do not think it was painful; I think that it worked rather well. I should say that that is perhaps because I was elected—I think largely because, having a name beginning with “A”, it came top of the list; had it been further down, God knows what would have happened, but luckily it was in alphabetical order. If a Peer cannot remain in this House for whatever reason, there could be a by-election among the political parties. During a Session, the Prime Minister would be able to advise Her Majesty to create further Peers, either to become Ministers in this House or to top up numbers.

I am sure that the Lib Dems and now UKIP want it to be based on share of the vote. I do not think that that would work because it would produce a House very different from the House of Commons. It would undoubtedly lead to a logjam of legislation, and it would not stand the test of time.

I also believe that we should look at the Bishops’ Benches. They should also limit their numbers of who should attend. I have always believed that we should find some way of ensuring that other faiths are better represented in this House than they are now.

The result of my modest proposal—it is simple, which is important—is that the Government would have a majority, but they could be easily defeated by a combination of opposition parties and the Cross Benches. We would still be a revising Chamber; we would still have clout. We might be respected, so that we might even be able to persuade the SNP to nominate Peers to attend this Chamber.

I hope that the opposition parties and the leader of the Cross Benches will work with the Government to consider proposals. Time is of the essence and we must not lose it. I understand that the position of the Lib Dems is that they do not feel bound by the Salisbury convention. If that is correct and they oppose or wreck government Bills in alliance with the Labour Party or whoever, that will put the final nail in the coffin of a second Chamber. I hope that when he comes to wind up on behalf of the Lib Dems the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, can enlighten us on their position. I do not think that the Commons would stand it.

We also have to wonder what the position is of the Labour Party. It has not been made clear. I am not sure whether its new leader is in favour of an elected second Chamber or its abolition. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, will reveal all when he comes to sum up for his party.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, I am sure that he gives thought to little else than Lords reform.

[Viscount Astor]

I am delighted to hear that. I very much look forward to the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, telling us what the views of his new leader and of his party are.

There is a small window of opportunity. We should be brave and grab it. I am convinced that reform must come from this House. If it does, we have a chance of putting together a second Chamber that will stand the test of time.

Interim Report: Leader's Group on Members Leaving the House

Viscount Astor Excerpts

Tuesday 16th November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Astor]

My Lords, there is no greater admirer of your Lordships' House than myself, but I think that it is agreed that the House has become too large. Perhaps I can remind your Lordships that this House is second only in size to the National People’s Congress of China, which has rather a greater number of citizens than the United Kingdom. According to my research, this House is the only second Chamber in any Commonwealth country that is nearly double the size of the first, so there clearly have to be some changes to our size.

The interim report of the group led by my noble friend Lord Hunt offers three main options. The first is an age limit, for which it is suggested that 75 might be the right age. That would get rid of about a third of your Lordships—some 250—and the size of the House would be about 500. On the face of it, that may be a sensible suggestion, but as we have heard from many of your Lordships—and as has been demonstrated by my noble friend Lord Ferrers—there are many in this House who are capable of giving virtuoso performances well beyond that age. However, a limit is certainly something that your Lordships must consider. On the second option, there is general agreement that a Peer who does not attend the House should not be allowed to remain. That must make sense. The third option is to consider length of service. To achieve a cut of about a third, the length of service would have to be 15 years. In my case, I would have overstayed my welcome by at least twice that amount—although some of your Lordships might therefore think that option to be a good idea.

However, whatever option is chosen—I perhaps prefer one defined by age—there should be transitional arrangements. We have heard from my noble friends on the Front Bench that there could be a form of grandfathering—so grandfathers, and even those who are not grandfathers, would be allowed to stay—which must make sense. However, we need to consider that, if High Court judges and right reverend Prelates have some age limit, such a limit must be sensible at least for any new Peers coming into this House.

My main point is that, if we do not come up with a sensible way forward, it will be imposed by another place. We cannot debate out or ignore reform. We know that something is coming. Unless we engage with the proposals, another place will insist on reform of this House that some of us will not want. As we know, the main political parties in their manifestos at the most recent election proposed a mainly elected second Chamber. That needs more debate. I am in favour of cutting down the number of your Lordships and having a proportion elected—perhaps based on Euro-constituencies, which I think would produce 76 elected Members—so as to allow us to move slowly in changing our constitution and to see whether the arrangements work.

While I do not think that there should be a moratorium on new Peers, I plead for some restraint on the numbers who are appointed to this House. If we have too many Peers, that will complicate how we take reform forward.

Finally, I thank my noble friend the Leader of the House for providing an opportunity for this debate and, in particular, for the fact that the debate is untimed. If there is one example of why debates in your Lordships' House need reform, it is the debate on reform of your Lordships’ House that took place on 11 October—for which I was unable to be here—when each speaker was allowed two minutes. The business managers for both the Government and the Opposition should be ashamed of that. I thank my noble friend for producing the report, which is welcome and should be taken seriously. I enter a plea that, if we do not work with another place to come up with sensible ideas for reform, those will be imposed on us without our having any input into what happens in the future.

House of Lords Reform

Viscount Astor Excerpts

Tuesday 29th June 2010 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Astor]

My Lords, one of the strengths of this House is that political parties in opposition love the place. It is the only Chamber where they can defeat the Government. Of course, once they get into power the love affair wanes as, often, the Government’s carefully planned Bills, which have inched their way through another place, are revised in this House. Then Ministers in another place get frightfully cross and start talking about the undemocratic nature of this House, or the cost to the Treasury of undoing their carefully thought-out plans. I hope that we never lose our reputation for awkwardness to Governments.

When one looks at our composition, we are a varied bunch and there are varied ways of getting here. One can be an elected hereditary Peer, like me. You can come from another place for services rendered or services to be rendered. Some noble Lords are active in retirement, but the sightings of some freshly made Peers from another place are as rare as those of a white rhino. You can also stay long enough in another place so that you get a peerage to encourage you to vacate the seat for some up-and-coming young politician. Finally, there is the more traditional Labour route; you deny vigorously that you ever want to come here; you rubbish the place vehemently; then, suddenly, a couple of months later you are here. I think that is the Healey, Hattersley and now the Prescott route.

In this House, you can be gallant, learned, right reverend, or even a people’s Peer; we are a mixed bunch. The question is how we can change this House, following the votes in another place and the recent general election result, and reflect the wishes of the electorate. One must start by saying that this House has become too large, as many noble Lords have said. As a parliamentary Chamber, this House is second in size only to the National People’s Congress of China. It is the only Parliament in the Commonwealth that I can find where the second Chamber is larger than the first. We are told that we will have more noble Lords arriving here. We have to do something, because we will soon have more than 800 Members. I am sure that there should be a way of encouraging some form of retirement, but if that does not work we may have to consider a mandatory retirement age, as for example happens for High Court judges. I also believe that the Cross Benches—this may be unpopular there—have become too large in relation to the political parties in this House. They are, in effect, almost the largest party.

We must remember that we are fundamentally a political chamber, not a debating society and however good our speeches, we are often self-congratulatory and too smug about what we do in this House. Too often, we have general debates; they are always informed and often fascinating, learned and entertaining, but the problem is that very few people listen—least of all Governments. That includes the noble Lords opposite and, indeed, my own noble friends. How often do we have brilliant foreign affairs debates, yet can anybody—from their time in government or the Civil Service—remember when, after a debate in this House, a Private Secretary has rushed in to see his Minister, saying, “Minister, you must read the Lords Hansard before you go to Brussels”—or to some important meeting—“because there has been a very interesting debate”? It just does not happen; we kid ourselves. Hansard is, I hope, read by those who have made the speeches. I have always thought that everybody should be forced to read their own speeches the following morning, as a sort of hangover cure. Perhaps there are a few insomniacs too.

Anyway, this House is at its best when it scrutinises and revises legislation. As we have heard, most amendments that are agreed in this House are accepted by another place and, as my noble friend Lord Jenkin of Roding pointed out, the Select Committees are very influential, so this House functions surprisingly well both because of recent reforms and, indeed, in spite of them. Yet any new reform must look at function as well as composition and everybody has their view to the future; sadly, so have I. We must move towards an elected second Chamber but, as we have seen in the past, rushed reforms do not always work well. We cannot bury our heads in the sand and hope that reforms will be sidelined or somehow go away. They are promoted by all three political parties.

A possible route would be to have elections based on Euro-constituencies for one Parliament. This would amount to 78 seats. If we were, over time, able to cut our number to around 400, that would amount to around 20 per cent. It would ensure that the grandfathering proposals put forward by my noble friend would work and we would need to consider how to move on from that change. The one advantage would be that if the consensus was that it was working, we could extend it. If it was not working, as might easily be the case, we could return to a fully appointed second Chamber. We have to find a way of getting all three major parties and their Front Benches off the hook of a fully elected Chamber. It will not go away. We have to help them.

We must improve what we do in this House. I am afraid we did not always hold the previous Government to account in the previous Parliament as we should have. We are too nice sometimes—too gentlemanly and perhaps too afraid of reform. We allowed a Minister to come here after having twice resigned his post in another place. We failed to hold the Government to account on the vast increase in national debt, the rise of unemployment, increased taxes and, most importantly, the breaking of our covenant to the Armed Forces.

I make one further plea. Reform of this House is too important just to be left to the political parties—even one as well led as my own. I suppose I must declare an interest as the stepfather-in-law of the Prime Minister—or, to put it more easily, I am married to his mother-in-law. I am very grateful to the Leader of the House for initiating this debate so early in the process of reform. I know he will take a close interest in everything that has been said this evening, and inform his colleagues in another place.