House of Lords: Lord Speaker’s Committee Report — House of Lords, 2017-12-19
Topic: Government Operations
John MacGregor (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Burns, and his committee for so expertly producing this analysis and for giving us the options for the road ahead and the basis for the decisions that I hope we will take. I am also grateful to the Lord Speaker for his initiative in setting up the committee As I go around the country and talk to people about the House of Lords, I increasingly find that they raise the question of the size of the Lords, partly due to media coverage. The public have cottoned on to the size question and are consoled when they raise it by my assuring them that we are tackling it. It is clear that we intend to do so by this very strong report and the very strong support that it is getting in the House. Moreover, many raised the point that they have been compelled to retire at a certain age—often imposed by their profession or company, or by Parliament itself—so why not us? Therefore, I thoroughly support all of the warm endorsements today of the committee’s work and most of the recommendations. There is clearly a strong consensus of support for the report in the House, a feeling that it provides an excellent basis for tackling the issue. I particularly agree on the importance of the point that Prime Ministers should not, in the future, undermine the whole system by appointing rafts of new Members, pushing the numbers back up again. It would be invidious and counterproductive if future Prime Ministers were to undermine the whole process by appointing more new Members than there were vacancies Having been wholly supportive so far, I have one reservation. There is, and increasingly will be, public concern that we are moving too slowly. As I understand it, the House, under these proposals, would only reach its target size of 600 in about 11 years. Only by 2042 would all serving Peers be on a 15-year fixed term. For many people outside the House, this would seem like a lifetime. It looks like, "Lord, make us virtuous, but not yet". How can we speed it up? The problem here is that the committee imposed a condition of not seeking primary legislation to assist. I am not quite sure why, so perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Burns, will explain this further when he winds up There are two recommendations in particular that would shorten the timescale, but they would require legislation. That is controversial for some, but they certainly would quicken the pace to reduce the number to 600. First, about two years ago, the executive committee of the Association of Conservative Peers—I was chairman then—recommended that Members should compulsorily retire at the end of the Parliament in which they had reached the age of 80. That is entirely reasonable: retirement is in practice required earlier than that for most people in employment in the United Kingdom. It was generally supported by most ACP members who considered it and has also been proposed by the equivalent Labour Party committee. Of course, it was objected to by drawing attention to the valuable contributions made by some over-80s. I will very soon be in that category: not the valuable contribution makers, but the over-80s. I do not think that that is a major obstacle; the proposal is entirely reasonable. It requires legislation, but I think it would be accepted by most in the House. I certainly intend to abide by it voluntarily, which means that I will leave the House at the next election. To make it effective, however, legislation is required Secondly, the time has come—this is a personal view, and distinctly not an ACP recommendation—to tackle the question of hereditary Peers. It needs to be addressed. If the by-election system for hereditary Peers continues unamended, in a smaller House of 600, the number of hereditary Peers would make up a larger proportion of the membership than it does now. It cannot be justified in this day and age to give an especially favourable position to hereditary Peers. Of course I acknowledge that many hereditary Peers make an excellent contribution, but with a smaller House, the time has come for our by-election system to cease. That, together with the proposal for compulsory retirement at 80, will make it possible to have a smaller House more quickly. I hope that these points can be considered in addition to the proposals in the report, and I warmly recommend the report itself.