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6.39 pm
Mr. Robert N. Wareing (Liverpool, West Derby): I find it difficult to listen to some of the speeches from Conservative Members, with the exception of that of the hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford (Mr. Wells), because they try to defend the indefensible. We have the spectacle of adversarial politics at its worst, because no one in the entire world could possibly defend the hereditary principle.
The Bill is not before time. Hereditary peers represent no one other than themselves. The whole principle is a denial of the basic democratic principle of equal citizenship. In 1701, Daniel Defoe put it succinctly when he said of the membership of the House of Lords:
The White Paper says:
Let us look at the possible composition of the second Chamber if it were elected. If it were elected simultaneously with the House of Commons, it would merely duplicate the membership of the House of Commons. People might say, "Elect it under a different system," but the arguments would then be about which system was the more democratic. However, if it were elected at different times from the House of Commons, doubts would be created about which was the more legitimate Chamber and the efficiency of the Executive would be reduced. Sometimes we may want to take that approach if we think that the Executive is too powerful, but having a second Chamber means taking Ministers away from more useful business.
If the second Chamber were purely nominated, it would lack the authority of a popular Chamber. It would be filled, irrespective of who the Prime Minister was, and the independent commission would not exist for ever, with placemen and women. If it were hostile to the Government, an indirectly elected Chamber could be destructive. If it were favourable to the Government, it would be superfluous.
One argument is--my hon. Friend the Member for Leominster (Mr. Temple-Morris) referred to it--that a second Chamber could be based on members of trades and professions, as a large section of the Irish Senate is. It could be, as they say, a House of experts, but is that really what we want? Do not forget that all those experts would be willing and able to talk on any subject in the House of Lords, senate, or whatever we like to call the second Chamber, irrespective of their experience.
If a person is elected to represent doctors, what weight could be given to the views that he or she expresses on, say, the euro? The House of Lords contains many notable lawyers. Lord Denning has been notable as a judge, but does that make his opinion on, say, the strategic defence review significant? Let us look at the function of the House of Lords.
Mr. Hawkins:
I was interested in the hon. Gentleman's choice of example. Anyone who knows the family history of Lord Denning, whose 100th birthday we were all glad to celebrate recently, knows that one of his brothers was a general and another was an admiral, so he might have had quite a lot to say about the strategic defence review.
Mr. Wareing:
Perhaps, but what Lord Denning has to say may not be significant.
Let us look at the question of delaying legislation. On the whole, legislation is not rushed. People talk about rushing legislation, but it is not rushed. Most of the important measures that have come before the House of Commons have emanated from ideas that have been debated over long periods.
Take, for example, devolution for Scotland. That has been argued about for decades. Some Scottish Members would probably argue that it has been debated ever since Culloden and that we are only just coming around to it. No one could say that that has been rushed.
When the nationalisation legislation was pushed through by the post-war Labour Government, it had been debated for decades. Even Winston Churchill had argued in 1909 for the nationalisation of the railways. It was not until 1947 that that came about.
I am pleased that the present Government are the first to legislate in favour of the minimum wage, but economists and others, including trade unionists, have argued and debated the whys and wherefores of the minimum wage for a very long period. I am sorry that we have had to wait until this Labour Government for it to make its way on to the statute book.
No one can say that that reform of the House of Lords has been rushed. It was debated after the 1909 Budget. We had the Parliament Act 1911. It took another seven years to get the Bryce report, with its complicated ideas for reform of the second Chamber. It was debated again in 1949 after the Tory Government held up the Bill to nationalise steel: the Parliament Bill was introduced in 1949 to reduce the delaying powers. Again, we had debates in 1968 about the reform of the House of Lords, which was scuppered largely--perhaps justifiably in view of the evidence at the time--by Michael Foot and Enoch Powell. We now have the debate yet again.
Legislation is not rushed. It is the length of time that has been taken to act on ideas, not hastiness in acting on them, that has frustrated our electors. They say, "Get on with it. If you believe in something, go ahead with the legislation."
We are told that we need a second Chamber to revise, but revision is not best done by a second Chamber that is composed in the ways that I have mentioned. Revision is best done--as the Government are doing--by consulting before legislation is introduced.
Mr. Damian Green (Ashford):
I quite agree with the hon. Gentleman that legislation is best introduced after consulting. It therefore seems perverse that he is supporting the House of Lords Bill just as a royal commission is being established to consult on it.
Mr. Wareing:
I have already made it clear that it has taken the House a long time to reach the point of debating a Bill abolishing the legislative rights of hereditary peers. The idea of abolishing those rights is not new; it goes back an awfully long way. The hon. Gentleman himself has probably, at some time, belonged to a debating society that debated the hereditary principle. Nevertheless, this is the first occasion on which the House has considered legislation expressing a determination to abolish those rights--something that any rational person should have expected Parliament to do many, many years ago.
There are other ways in which the revisory process may be performed. Advisory bodies, for example, surround the Executive and could perform such a function. If there is a legislative problem--where revision is necessary because of a drafting problem--parliamentary counsel would be available to deal with it. Why do we have parliamentary counsel, if not to advise on drafting legislation?
If there is a failure of substance in legislation, the best way of dealing with it would be by establishing working commissions, comprising members of appropriate trades, professions or interests. Such a commission could be established to consider each Bill.
When the Labour party was in opposition,and Mrs. Thatcher's Government was introducing legislation--such as the Health and Medicines Bill in 1988--we, like other Oppositions before us, consulted the British Medical Association, the Royal College
of Nursing, trade unions and dentists' professional organisations. In future, such consultation could be performed in a much more formalised manner.
A dentist is not required in a second Chamber to debate foreign policy. However, in working commissions, dentists could debate parliamentary business, give advice and point out the difficulties and potholes on the pathway to legislation.
Mr. A. J. Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed):
They could also point out the cavities.
Mr. Wareing:
I have known the right hon. Gentleman for many years, and I appreciate his sense of humour.
"Great families of yesterday we show,
Hereditary peers are responsible to no one, but they are overwhelmingly Tory politically; there can be no argument about that. They are partial in throwing their weight against Labour and Liberal Governments. After the Parliament Act 1911, two Bills of the Liberal Government--the Welsh Church Bill and the Home Rule Bill for Ireland--were thrown out by the House of Lords. I quote the playwright Tom Stoppard, who said that the House of Lords exercises
And lords whose parents were the Lord knows who."
"responsibility without power, the prerogative of the eunuch throughout the ages."
It is said that a second Chamber has three main functions: to delay hasty legislation, to act as a revising Chamber, and to ease the burdens on the House of Commons. The last function will be largely lifted as a result of devolution. I agree with the hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford: I hope that devolution will include the English regions.
"Britain needs a two-chamber legislature",
but does it? I question that. I agreed with an enormous amount of what the hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford said about reform of the Houses of Parliament; I will not go over all that he said, but I found myself agreeing with much of it. I ask the Government to put before the royal commission an option that is not mentioned in the White Paper: not having a second Chamber at all.
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