Reform of the House of Lords

[3] Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg introduced the House of Lords Reform Bill 2012 on 27 June 2012[4] which built on proposals published on 17 May 2011.

This was necessary as the Conservative Party had an absolute majority in the House of Lords, and it was seen as inappropriate for them to use this to block the Labour government's policies following their landslide victory in 1945.

The Life Peerages Act 1958 enabled the appointment of a new class of peers, who could sit and vote in the House of Lords, but the honour and rights would not be hereditary.

However, the system has come under criticism in 'cash for honours' scandals in which those who donate significant sums to political parties may be able to gain membership of the House of Lords, undermining its credibility as a revising chamber.

Since 1911 there have been various attempts to reform the Lords, but none tackled the powers of the House except the Parliament Act 1949 which reduced the suspensory veto to one change of session and one year.

Of these, two are ex officio members due to their ceremonial functions in Parliament, and the other 90 are chosen from among those with qualifying hereditary peerages, in a procedure established by standing orders of the House.

It published its report[9] in 2000 with 132 recommendations of which the main were: In a debate in the House of Lords on 7 March 2000, Baroness Jay of Paddington expressed the government's broad acceptance of the commission's report: The Government accept the principles underlying the main elements of the Royal Commission's proposals on the future role and structure of this House, and will act on them.

[11] In the debate in the Commons on 19 June 2000 the Government announced the establishment of a Joint Committee of both houses to consider the Royal Commission's work.

[12] But in a written reply on 6 March 2001 the Government stated there was little prospect of a Joint Committee being established in the present Parliament due to a failure of cross-party discussions.

On 7 November 2001, the government launched a white paper and consultation stating: A credible and effective second chamber is vital to the health of Britain's democracy ...

[14][15] On 11 December 2002, the Joint Committee published its first report, which set out "an inclusive range of seven options for the composition of a reformed House of Lords".

But nine members of the Joint Committee issued a statement coinciding with the publication which stated: Since the House of Commons rejected the option of a fully appointed Second Chamber by a large majority on 4th February it would be absurd and unacceptable to introduce legislation which would have that effect.

[20][full citation needed]In June 2003, Tony Blair announced the creation of a new department to oversee constitutional change with Lord Falconer of Thoroton as its first Secretary of State.

The department was tasked with: When in 2003 Lord Falconer of Thoroton signalled the government's preference for an all appointed House of Lords, three members of the Liberal Democrats issued a statement: We, together with other members of the committee, issued a statement at the same time stating our belief that the committee could not continue to act in the absence of an indication of the government's preferred route to achieve its manifesto commitment to a more representative and democratic House of Lords.Ministers responded, saying: We cannot accept the removal of the remaining hereditary peers on its own, but only as part of much wider measures of reform to create a democratic and accountable second chamber. ...

On 8 February 2007, the Government published a new white paper[29] following discussions of a cross-party working group convened by Jack Straw, Leader of the House of Commons.

Whilst the white paper made recommendations for a half-elected, half-appointed House, it proposed a free vote of MPs among seven options as to composition (see below).

[32]Prior to the debate Lord Lipsey, former economics editor of The Sunday Times, estimated the cost of the plans in the white paper at £1.092 billion over a 15-year term.

[34] The government dismissed this as "back-of-an-envelope calculations"[35] and Jack Straw told the House of Commons that May I say that Lord Lipsey's estimate is absolute utter balderdash and nonsense?

[40] This was issued by the Secretary of State for Justice Jack Straw in July 2008, containing proposals to create a wholly elected second chamber.

The Joint Committee on House of Lords Reform published its final report on 23 April 2012[46] and made the following suggestions: The bill, introduced by Nick Clegg, was given its first reading on 27 June 2012.

[60][61][62] Across the aisle, Conservative Lord Norton of Louth introduced a private member's bill in September 2024 to reform the peerage appointment process by creating an advisory commission.

[71] In January 2020, during the 2020 Labour Party leadership election, candidate Rebecca Long-Bailey announced her support for abolishing the House of Lords.

Most proposals referred to the allotment of the governing juries in the democracy of Ancient Greece, where selection by lot was considered to be more democratic than election: I mean, for example, that it is thought to be democratic for the offices to be assigned by lot, for them to be elected is oligarchic.Research has suggested that parliaments including randomly selected members are likely to be more efficient and to result in greater benefits to society.

[citation needed][dubious – discuss] In particular the large number of cross bench peers would be impossible to achieve in most electoral systems.

Moreover, in practice, the hereditary peers had a natural bias on certain issues, such as a socially conservative outlook and unwillingness to support liberal and socialist legislation.

[citation needed] (In the events which led to the original legislation to reduce their power, the House of Lords were opposed to the People's Budget, which did not serve their interests, as it was built to help the middle and lower classes, while taxing land owners and the "idle rich", promising wealth redistribution.

[89]) About 30% of overseas second chambers are elected by indirect methods, including the upper houses of France, the Republic of Ireland, the Netherlands, South Africa and the pre-1913 United States.

Whether his ideas might lead to changing the name of the House of Commons remains to be seen, as presumably any adoption of Steel's Senate proposals might consequently permit the aristocracy to stand for parliament.

Also, transitional arrangements would have to be made to decide which existing members of the House of Lords would stay on, for five or ten years respectively, as the "sitting 300".

Steel's outline proposals did not specifically mention the Lords Spiritual, but, just like hereditary peers, presumably bishops would no longer have any reserved seats in the Senate.