Lords talking about themselves ‘to destruction’ during hereditary peers debate

Members of the House of Lords are talking about themselves “to destruction” amid a proposed law to oust hereditary peers, Parliament has heard.

Labour peer Lord Grocott, who has long campaigned to end birthright membership of the upper chamber, criticised colleagues for the pace of debate on the legislation.

He argued that the Bill is a narrow and specific one, with just five clauses, intending to end the right for hereditary peers to sit and vote in the Lords, not to carry out wider reform of the unelected chamber.

The former MP said: “Everyone knows that no organisation is happier than when it’s talking about itself and we’re demonstrating this, I think testing it to destruction, during the debate on this Bill so far.

“A simple five-clause Bill would not normally have an attendance like this.”

His comments came as peers continued their line-by-line scrutiny of the House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill, which is on its third day of committee stage.

Lord Grocott continued: “So far we’ve discussed, up to today, 10 groups of amendments. There are 32 groups left to discuss. We are averaging five groups a day.

“At this rate of progress, we shall be debating this for committee day after committee day after committee day, some of us no doubt enjoying ourselves. We all like talking about our own organisation and how we work.

“But in relation to other matters that this House should be considering on the floor of the House, to spend another six, seven or eight days or more that these stats suggest we will be doing on this Bill, repeating arguments that have been heard on numerous occasions and 90% of which we know are not directly related to the Bill and will at any event some of them come forward at a later time…”

Lord Grocott, who has tabled numerous private member’s bills over years attempting to remove the remaining hereditary peers, insisted: “We really do need to do better today if we want to be seen as relevant.”

Former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Sentamu agreed, saying: “I am not a prophet, nor a prophet’s son, but I would like to have a healthy check. None of the amendments you put are going to end up in this Bill.”

He added that the amendments “have nothing to do with the Bill” and that peers are “luxuriating” by discussing further reforms that are set to happen in the future.

Lord Strathclyde, a Conservative hereditary peer, said: “There is no attempt to try and filibuster this debate.”

Peers debated for more than two and a half hours the idea of adding to the Bill an attendance or participation requirement for members of the Lords.

Several argued that a participation requirement was listed in Labour’s election manifesto, alongside the ousting of hereditary peers.

However, the Government argued that there is no consensus on what this participation requirement should be and that the Bill is the first step in the process of wider Lords reform.

During the prolonged debate, peers exchanged numerous ideas on how a participation requirement could work.

It was suggested that peers could be required to attend a certain percentage of sitting days, with debate about whether this should be set at 1%, 10%, 15% or higher, and potentially with exceptions for those with a good reason or a leave of absence.

However, some argued that this would eliminate “low frequency, high impact” peers who are at the top of their fields and only contribute occasionally on the subject they are an expert in.

It was also argued that it could result in peers coming in as “lobby fodder” to vote and do little else.

It was then suggested that peers should be required not just to attend, but to actively participate.

This could take the form of speaking in the chamber or grand committee, serving on a select committee, asking oral questions, tabling written questions or taking part in official delegations overseas.

It was argued that this would eke out those peers who “clock in and disappear”, but others claimed this would create a “perverse incentive” to take part in proceedings only to meet the minimum requirement.

Attorney General Lord Hermer said there is “very considerable agreement” that peers should be obliged to participate, that metrics to measure participation should be decided on, and that failure to meet these without good reason would be “incompatible” with membership of the Lords.

But this is where the agreement ends, he said.

The senior law officer said: “As the amendments and the debate today has demonstrated, there is as yet no measure of agreement as to what the requisite participation levels should be, what the metrics will be.

“Participation in this house can take many different forms, but specifying which should be the metrics applied to requisite participation is a complicated and nuanced matter…

“We are not yet at a point where consensus has been reached and further work and further discussion is required.”

Lord Hermer told peers that Lords leader Baroness Smith of Basildon has engaged in “over 60” discussions with peers to develop the plan for how to move forward with further reforms after this Bill.

He concluded: “The Government is committed to moving forward, hopefully through consensus, to push to the next level of reform, at which participation will be key.”