House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill

Lord Newby Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 9th July 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Newby (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Burns, for his amendment and the way he introduced it. He raised four very substantial issues—much more substantial than most of the issues we have spent most of the day debating. Should there be a maximum size of the House? How do we get there? How do we then stop recidivist Governments breaching it? Once we have got there, how do we balance the new appointments between the various parties?

The first and third questions are very straightforward. Yes, there should be a limit. Yes, it will mean that no Prime Minister can then threaten to flood the House with 100 new Peers, but the last time that was tried was over 110 years ago, and it has not proved to be a necessary part of public policy-making in the interim. Is the noble Lord, Lord Gove, right when he says the more voices, the better? Clearly, there is a point at which that ceases to be the case, and what we are arguing about is where that should be. If there were 5,000 people here, there would clearly be too many voices, and we would not be able to do anything. Those of us who have spent many hours debating here, including everybody who has been involved with the Burns amendment, have formed the view that the place would be better if it had a cap on its numbers. So, yes, there should be a cap on the numbers. It should be a legislative cap. If we have that, it solves the problem of how we stop future Prime Ministers ratcheting up the numbers again—they will not be allowed to do it by law.

How do we get to that number, 650 or whatever it is? Actually, if we do what we say we are going to do in terms of retirement and participation, we get beyond that number; we get below it. In fact, one of the arguments about having a straightforward retirement age is that we are taking out too many people, so I do not think that the bit of the noble Lord’s amendment that deals with how we get to the number would be needed in practice.

If we agree that there should be a limit and that it means you cannot ratchet up again, and if we say that we get to the limit by the combination of retirement and participation limits, the difficult question that remains is: once you have got below the limit, how do you decide on the balance of appointments? The noble Lord says there is a convention that the Labour Party and the Conservative Party should have broad parity of numbers. That may be fine, but there are some others of us here, both on these Benches and the noble Lord’s. What are we going to do about all that?

In his original report, the noble Lord came up with an elegant proposal to deal with the balance that related to votes and seats over a period of three general elections. It would have had the advantage of being a stabilising force while still reflecting the fact that the House has to move with the country. I supported that at the time, as I think the Government did, and would support it again.

On how we implement all this, if we could agree on it all, given that the debate about retirement is in part a debate about numbers, one of the issues will be how quickly we do it. If we require primary legislation to deal with retirement, I do not see why it would be illogical to include something about numbers in that.

How you deal with my point about how you rebalance over time once you have got below the cap, whether you do that by convention or statute, is a matter for another day. The only thing that worries me slightly is that framing a statute that could not be amended in the light of changing political circumstances might be quite difficult.

These are hugely important issues. There is quite a lot of consensus on some of them, but I hope we are able to debate them sensibly and make progress on them during the course of the Parliament and in the context of the other debates we are having, not least on retirement.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, in many ways this is the most important amendment we are considering today, because it is the only attempt to curb the power of the Executive over Parliament. The Bill, as the Government drafted it, shifts the scales rather dangerously in their favour. It leaves the Prime Minister the sole person responsible for deciding who comes to this House and who leaves it. If we were to throw out the small number of excepted hereditary Peers in the way that the Bill as originally drafted put it, which the House has now voted against, every Member of this House would be appointed by, or subject to the approval of, the Prime Minister of the day—a situation found in no other democratic Chamber.

As we have heard from our debates in Committee and last week, the House of Lords Appointments Commission, HOLAC, has no power to insist on the nominations it makes, and no guaranteed number or guaranteed timescale. While this Parliament has already seen the introduction of 45 Labour Peers, 21 Conservatives and three Liberal Democrats, the independent commission has not been permitted to make any nominations under the present Prime Minister.

In our debate last week, the Leader of the House confirmed that the four Cross-Bench Peers announced last month were people of the Prime Minister’s own selection, not the House of Lords Appointments Commission’s. Moreover, in the statement the Prime Minister made alongside that announcement, he made clear that, like his predecessors, he would be prepared to overrule HOLAC in exceptional circumstances if it objected to one of his nominations on the grounds of propriety.

Even the Lords spiritual, notwithstanding the changes made under that great Presbyterian Gordon Brown, pass through Downing Street on the way to their episcopal throne. Crucially, the procedural changes made by Mr Brown are not set in statute and so could be undone by a future Prime Minister with a snap of their fingers.

I have served in government in different capacities under four Prime Ministers. I have seen the power of patronage and the seductive temptations it offers to Prime Ministers as their other powers wane. We have seen the current Prime Minister wielding that power already—that is not new and not unique to him, but the Bill he has sent us would leave him more powerful than any of his predecessors and leave him and those who follow him free to succumb to those temptations without, as noble Lords have put it, any guard-rails.

At the beginning of his premiership, Sir Keir Starmer began by appointing new Peers at a faster rate than any Prime Minister for three decades. I am glad that he has now slowed down, but he could change speed again whenever he wants. The Leader of the House has argued, and I can see will argue again, that that is because of the profligacy of his predecessors—following the argument made by the noble Lord, Lord Burns, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, about the ratchet effect that leaves us in this situation after every general election. In doing so, she and the Prime Minister have given the game away that the Bill is not just about ending the hereditary peerage but about removing a large number of Peers from beyond the Government Benches.

The Leader has told us repeatedly that, even with that excision, the Labour Party will form only 28% of the seats in your Lordships’ House. Can she tell us today, with the same clarity, that she expects and intends the Labour Party to form the same proportion by the end of this Parliament, or does she see why so many of us, like Elvis Presley, have “Suspicious Minds” about that?

More worryingly still, we have seen the power of executive patronage in action throughout our debates on the Bill. I am sure I am not the only one to have noticed the conspicuous number of abstentions in some of the Divisions so far, or to have been surprised by the arguments of noble Lords who are usually so robust in asserting our role as a revising Chamber advising that on this Bill, which has such profound consequences not just for your Lordships’ House but for our constitutional settlement, we should not make any amendment at all or disagree with the House of Commons, who have still—the majority of them—sat for only 170 days. I detect a certain nervousness, not just among our hereditary colleagues or those over or approaching the age of 80, about voting for things that might annoy the present Government. I know the Leader will want every Member of your Lordships’ House to know that they can and should perform their legislative scrutiny on this Bill, as on any other, without fear or favour, so I hope she can reassure us that no one, even those who would vote on the Bill in a way that she would rather they did not, will suffer any ill feeling or consequence from the Government.

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[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.

[Baroness Lawlor (Con)]

My Lords, I am intrigued by my noble friend’s amendment. Yes, it would make good some of the failings of the Government, who have not honoured their 1998 pledge to bring forward their proposals for reform before they remove the hereditary Peers. Nor have they delivered on their promise in the manifesto of 2024 to bring forward proposals for reform on composition, in terms of retirement age, participation obligations and so on. It would perhaps be a good way of making good the problem we face, which is the removal of over 80 of the Peers who are most effective in scrutinising the Government and holding them to account. One cannot help but agree with those who see this Bill as vindictive for that reason, and a partisan attack on the ability of this House to fulfil its constitutional function.

However, dare I part company with my noble friend Lord Blencathra? I feel it is a very bad move to have government by committee—even a Select Committee of this House. By their very nature, committees do not have a sense of the feeling of the whole House, or indeed of the country, which is more important. For this reason, I would worry about such powers for a Select Committee.

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[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—

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[Lord Newby (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, described the preamble as “fine words”. He will know the saying, “Fine words butter no parsnips”. Well, these words have buttered no parsnips for over a hundred years and, personally, I have had enough of fine words on their own.

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I am slightly disappointed that this is the second time this evening that the noble Lord, Lord Newby, has failed to put the case for election when he was talking about the best way to deal with limiting the size of the House and prevent it growing. The best way is to have a constituted, elected House where the people decide how the numbers in the House change. Now, again, he has failed to align himself with the long-held wish of his party to see election. At this late hour, my noble friend has elicited a notable reticence from the party opposite in pursuing its electoral objectives.

[Lord Newby (LD)]

The noble Lord seems to forget that I moved an amendment for an elected House of Lords and, unless my recollection is faulty, he chose not to support it.

[Lord True (Con)]

Well, that is true. The elements are greatly mixed in us, as Shakespeare taught us. There is that terrible duo word of “PR” that always lurks around in any proposition that comes from the noble Lord, Lord Newby.

I do not think that this is a time for reflection on the progress of this Bill. We will have a chance for that next week on “Bill do now pass”. I am pleased that, in general, the conduct of the debates has been good and important issues have been raised. I fear that a more appropriate preamble for this Bill would be something along the lines of, “Whereas it is desired to create an all-appointed House, and no proposals have yet been presented to restrict growth in the power of the Executive over such a House, it is politically expedient to exclude immediately over 80 Members of Parliament who do not support the Executive”. I think that would probably be a reasonably accurate preamble.

I am grateful to the noble Baroness for the patience and willingness to engage with the House that she has again shown in the Chamber this evening. I liked my noble friend’s impish and humble address to the House, but I think that, when the time comes, he should probably withdraw the amendment.