House of Lords Bill [HL]

My Lords, one of the things that one notices about debates in your Lordships’ House is that words that are frequently used here are used in a sense that is other than the normal sense. I refer to the term "reform" of the House of Lords. Most people who discuss reform of the House of Lords actually want the destruction of the House of Lords in its present form. The noble Lord, Lord McNally, may shake his head but the nature of this House would be totally changed if an elected element were introduced; that is what he wants. Why he should want it is beyond me, but there you go. As has rightly been pointed out, the Bill does not address any of the arguments for or against the Government’s—or anybody else’s, for that matter—proposals for an elected element in the House. What it does is remove a whole lot of silly irritants, which should have been removed a long time ago and are advanced as reasons for changing the composition of this House. When those irritants are removed, those who wish to change the composition of this House will have to argue, in total nakedness, the case for making this place a second-class edition of another place down the Corridor, and I think that they will find their position very much weakened as a result. Therefore, I totally welcome the Bill and I cannot wait for it to come into effect. I want to say just one other thing. I am wholly in favour of patronage. This country would not work without patronage, and its greatest supporter is the present Prime Minister. He has found himself quite incapable of governing this country without, over the past few weeks, appointing a collection of very distinguished people to this place, and he has been quite right to do so. It just shows that in the Prime Minister’s view the electoral process does not produce people of adequate quality to govern this country. That is obvious. I do not want to see anything limiting the power of patronage in Prime Ministers, and if a Prime Minister uses patronage in a stupid way, the remedy is the ballot box. I have no great affection for what the House of Lords commission has done, although I know that it is showered with eulogies. I think that some of the appointments that it has made are, frankly, idiotic. I do not say that the people who come here are idiots but the reasons that have been advanced for appointing some people to this place are idiotic. Finally, there is one thing that I should like to see that is not in the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Steel. If we are to have a commission, which we probably will, it should be given guidance to the effect that no one who has sought to lobby to come here should ever be considered.