House of Lords: Lord Speaker’s Committee Report

Lord Blencathra Excerpts

Tuesday 19th December 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, I cheer the wise words of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, that we are close to a constitutional absurdity. I am also fairly certain that I sent the longest submission to the noble Lord, Lord Burns, and his committee. It was 30 pages long and more than 11,000 words. It had dozens of detailed Excel spreadsheets attached and took me many weeks—indeed, months—to write. I produced what I thought were impeccable arguments for a retirement age of 80 and removal of Peers who had failed to attend fewer of 20% of the sittings of the last Parliament. That would have removed 220 Peers at a stroke. I considered the 15-year term option and creating Peers based on a combination of MPs’ seats won and share of the vote, and I rejected it. I was rather pleased with my magnum opus.

Now we are faced with the committee’s report, and I have no hesitation in saying that I completely endorse it—it is a masterful piece of work. The report highlights the biggest flaws in my fixed retirement age recommendation, namely that political parties would send us younger people, under 50, so they would serve at least 30 years. I have to admit that after 15 years the expertise that we formerly had begins to get a bit rusty, so that term limit may be about right. I also completely endorse the committee’s views on hereditary and new Minister Peers. I think that it cleverly takes the issue out of the question. If a political party replaces an hereditary, it simply comes out of the overall quota, and there is one less life peerage available. In my opinion, the system of electing replacement hereditaries in this House has given us some of the most hardworking and able Peers in this House, on all sides. I would also say that the hereditary problem is one for the Conservative Party to address internally, and come up with possible solutions.

I turn to a part of the report that I consider very important, and the key to ensuring that numbers do not inexorably rise once again. In my submission, I made a very strong point about creating what I called non-legislative Peers. I said:

“We should accept that Prime Ministers need to grant peerages not just because they want bodies in the Lords but because they need to reward achievement in the same way as others receive other honours. Being granted the title ‘Lord’ or ‘Baroness’ is a great reward in itself and I can see merit in Prime Ministers being able to grant a peerage and the title Lord or Baroness to some who would not be entitled to sit in the Lords.


I cannot define a category of these people but it may be those in business, or retired from the civil service or over a certain age who deserve the glory of the title but do not want to participate for 70% of more of Lords’ sittings. I believe we can all look round this House and see colleagues on all sides who have wanted the great honour of being a Peer of The Realm but do not want to participate much or at all in the legislative process. I am certain that this suggestion would give Prime Ministers the flexibility they need to create peerages without flooding the House of Lords with new peers”


That is what I said in my submission, and I am therefore delighted to see that the committee endorses that point and states in paragraphs 24 and 25 that the Life Peerages Act can already permit it. That is excellent news, but it has not received nearly enough attention in the debate so far, nor enough prominence in the report. I urge the Lord Speaker, the political parties, and the leaders of all groups to really make sure that Prime Ministers understand this point. They can dish out the gongs in future but they do not have to flood this House.

I am glad that there is no greatly increased role for the House of Lords Appointments Commission, except doing the statistical calculations after an election, assisted, I assume, by our excellent clerks. The report suggests a sensible timetable to bring about change but we need the flexibility to move more quickly if circumstances permit. I have in mind the possibility of decanting out of Parliament to the QEII in 2023 or 2024. As one or two other noble Lords have mentioned, I suspect that there may be a big rush of Peers wishing to retire then. HOLAC therefore needs the flexibility to adjust the process to reduce numbers to 550 or even 500 if there is a rush of Peers retiring under any circumstances.

Finally, this report is not what I argued for but it is better than the case I put up. I am willing to give the committee’s solution a go since I cannot see any better one on the horizon, now or in the future, although at one point I thought my noble friend Lord Robathan was going to argue for some celebrity TV show—“I’m a Peer, Get Me Out of Here!”. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Burns, and his colleagues on the committee. This is the blueprint for a far better Chamber, which will earn respect from most sensible critics, and I commend it to the House.