Vol. 783 Friday No. 24 8 September 2017 PARLIAMENTARYDEBATES (HANSARD) HOUSE OF LORDS OFFICIAL REPORT ORDEROFBUSINESS House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) (Abolition of By-Elections) Bill [HL] Second Reading.............................................................................................................2151 Age of Criminal Responsibility Bill [HL] Second Reading.............................................................................................................2186 Modern Slavery (Victim Support) Bill [HL] Second Reading.............................................................................................................2212 Hurricane Irma Private Notice Question................................................................................................2248 Lords wishing to be supplied with these Daily Reports should give notice to this effect to the Printed Paper Office. No proofs of Daily Reports are provided. 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This issue of the Official Report is also available on the Internet at https://hansard.parliament.uk/lords/2017-09-08 The first time a Member speaks to a new piece of parliamentary business, the following abbreviations are used to show their party affiliation: Abbreviation Party/Group CB Cross Bench Con Conservative DUP Democratic Unionist Party GP Green Party Ind Lab Independent Labour Ind LD Independent Liberal Democrat Ind SD Independent Social Democrat Ind UU Independent Ulster Unionist Lab Labour LD Liberal Democrat LD Ind Liberal Democrat Independent Non-afl Non-affiliated PC Plaid Cymru UKIP UK Independence Party UUP Ulster Unionist Party No party affiliation is given for Members serving the House in a formal capacity, the Lords spiritual, Members on leave of absence or Members who are otherwise disqualified from sitting in the House. © Parliamentary Copyright House of Lords 2017, this publication may be reproduced under the terms of the Open Parliament licence, which is published at www.parliament.uk/site-information/copyright/. 2151 House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill[8 SEPTEMBER 2017] House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill 2152 House of Lords and the case for retaining them inexorably weaker—so much so that any neutral observer would surely conclude Friday 8 September 2017 that it is not so much a matter of whether the by-elections will cease, but when. 10 am The debates on the Bill last year, and the discussions Prayers—read by the Lord Bishop of Southwark. that surrounded them, have shown beyond doubt that there is overwhelming support in this House for the reform that I am proposing. Support has come from House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Labour, Liberal Democrats, Conservatives and Cross- (Abolition of By-Elections) Bill [HL] Benchers—including a very large number of hereditaries Second Reading themselves, who have come to me and, understandably, find it difficult to speak on this subject. I would love to 10.05 am know what the actual numbers were among the Moved by Lord Grocott hereditaries of those in favour and those against the change. When the opinion of the House was tested in That the Bill be now read a second time. Committee—of course, on a Friday, when Divisions are rare—the first vote on the principle of the Bill Lord Grocott (Lab): My Lords, just a year ago I resulted in a defeat for its opponents by a majority of introduced a Bill with exactly the same objective as the 93. There can be no reasonable doubt that the number one I am proposing today. Regrettably, despite very of Members of this House who are resolutely opposed strong support from all parts of the House, the Bill to this Bill is minuscule. was blocked in Committee by a small number of Peers. My motive in reintroducing the Bill is unchanged: The weakness of the Bill’s opponents could not be the by-election system, which provides for the better illustrated than by the tactics they employed in continuation—effectively in perpetuity—of a block of Committee. In the three months last year between 90 hereditary Peers is absurd and indefensible. In the Second Reading and Committee stage, just six 12 months since the last Bill, there have been significant amendments were tabled. Then, lo and behold, on the developments that make the case for scrapping the day before the debate, inspiration and creativity by-elections even more compelling. overwhelmed two Members of this House: the noble Let us remind ourselves briefly how the system Lord, Lord Trefgarne,and the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, works. There are 90 elected places. If a vacancy occurs tabled 50 amendments overnight. My Lords, we all among the 15 hereditary Peers who were originally know what that is about: a tiny number of Members officeholders—that is, Deputy Speakers—the electorate knowing they were in a hopeless minority in the House consist of all 803 Members of the House. The remaining and knowing that they could not win by votes so they 75 hereditaries are distributed among three party groups had better win by tricks. Fifty overnight amendments—if and the Cross-Benchers.The electorate for each by-election you are going to wreck a Bill, do it a bit more subtly. then consist of the hereditary Peers who are members This time, my appeal to anyone who is thinking of of the group where the vacancy has arisen. As a trying these tactics is to please think again. They do reminder, the numbers are as follows: for a Conservative neither noble Lords’ nor the House’s reputation any vacancy,48 hereditary Peers can vote; for a Cross-Bencher, good. They should win by the arguments and in the it is 30; for a Lib Dem, three; and for Labour, three. Division Lobbies, not by tricks. It is the opinion of the Try explaining that nonsense to members of the House that should prevail, not the opinion of one or public as a mechanism for recruiting people to serve in two of its Members. Parliament; I guarantee their jaws will hit the floor. It I also say to anyone who is thinking of wrecking the makes the d’Hondt system look simple, and given that Bill this time to please think of the adverse publicity the system is so manifestly absurd, is it any wonder for our House that that will attract. I will give three that it results in the most absurd by-elections? I cannot examples from the media since then: resist repeating the example I gave last year of a Lib “Hereditary Peers Set To Ambush Bill Aimed At Scrapping Dem by-election following the death of Eric Lubbock— Their ‘Laughable’ By-Elections”. the first person, I might add, who raised the issue of Another headline is: trying to scrap these by-elections. It was held in April “‘An embarrassment to our politics!’ Fury as Lords prepare to 2016, when the number of candidates was 11 and the elect new hereditary peer”. electorate was three. By way of comparison, before the Finally, we have: Great Reform Act 1832, even Old Sarum had an “Tory aristocrat joins Parliament for life by winning 143 votes electorate of seven. In comparison with the Lib Dem in a ‘Blackadder’ by-election”. by-election, that is a metropolis. I am the last person on the planet to argue that we I can hear Members asking: “But your Bill failed should change a good policy because of some bad last year, so why waste parliamentary time again?”. newspaper headlines, but it is noticeable that there is Noble Lords: Hear, hear! absolutely nobody, apart from a handful of people in this House, who is prepared to defend these by-elections. Lord Grocott: Well, I will give the answer—and I The argument for their continuation is friendless, hope that Members will give their answers during their and surely that is because simply there are no such speeches as well. Even in the 12 months since the last good arguments. Bill, there have been a number of developments, all of I challenge anyone today who is thinking of opposing which make the case for ending the by-elections stronger, my Bill to not give us a history lesson. Instead, come 2153 House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill[LORDS] House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill 2154 [LORD GROCOTT] “this House believes that its size should be reduced, and methods clean and explain to us, in 2017, what added value the should be explored by which this could be achieved.” by-elections provide to our parliamentary system. Tell As a result of that debate, the Lord Speaker established us precisely why we continue to replace the 90 hereditary a committee under the noble Lord, Lord Burns, to Peers. Tell us what the distinctive characteristics of the consider the issue. The committee is due to report in 198 people on the Register of Hereditary Peers are October. What has that to do, you may well ask, with that mean that we need to provide them with a reserved my Bill to end the by-elections? The answer is that if place in our legislature? Once elected, what is special we are to reduce the size of the Lords to around about their parliamentary talents that distinguishes 600 Members so that it is smaller than the Commons, them from other Members of the House? To make it surely we will have to amend the legislation that preserves personal, what is the justification for the heir of a in aspic 90 places for hereditary Peers. If we reduce the hereditary Peer in this House having a one in 200 chance size of this House without changing the law on the of becoming a member of the legislature while for hereditary bloc, the proportion of hereditaries would everyone else in the country, that chance is something rise from 11% to 15%.