My Lords, for similar reasons, I will keep my comments brief, not least since I see that the target is to reach Amendment 42 this evening.
There is general agreement that the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, has done us a service, because he has identified a problem. The question is how we address that problem, and there are two facets to it. One is how to ensure that there is a review of the present Chamber,
but the problem has also been identified as to how, as responsibilities grow, it is going to cope with the demands made on it.
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As noble Lords have agreed, the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, has identified the problem but not actually come up with the most appropriate answer. I very much share the view of the noble Lord, Lord Maxton. On the one hand, you have an elected Chamber and on the other hand you are just giving it the power to review, to propose and pass resolutions but no power to say no to the other Chamber. That is a recipe for instability because elected Members will start saying that they are as legitimate as the Members of the other place and demanding more powers. How we then look at the problem has been the conundrum. Noble Lords have said that there is a problem but we are not sure what the answer is.
I recommend that we look at legislatures elsewhere. The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, said that there were a lot of bicameral legislatures. Indeed, there are, but they are in the minority. Most legislatures are actually unicameral. We could look at them and see how they go about addressing what we have identified today. One possibility is having an elected body that splits itself into two chambers. There are different things to look at.
There is a problem and I accept the point that this is not the Bill on which to start engaging in significant but piecemeal change. But this gives us an opportunity to stand back, recognise the problems and think through the consequences, which we are very bad at doing. I accept that the ideal would be to look at all the problems in the round and how they relate to one another, and stop doing things in this rather piecemeal basis.