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Monday, November 24, 2003

House of Lords reform

Picking up some of the points made to me about possible reforms for the House of Lords, there are two base points that I would make. Firstly with an unwritten constitution a fully elected Chamber would be strongly tempted to compete with the Commons and would also be dominated by political parties. This creates a real risk of it duplicating the Commons. Secondly a fully appointed Chamber risks being marginalised as a creature of the establishment (however we might define that!) and not legitimate enough.
That is why my preference is for a hybrid House,that is, part elected and part appointed. If the appointments are made through an independent appointments commission (as currently proposed) then the Prime Ministers patronage is greatly reduced. We would still have the advantage of appointing people with special skills or knowledge such as scientists. Philip Hunt suggested that we draw members on a random basis from the electoral role to serve not more then 5 years. It's attractive at first glance but my experience suggests that you really need to have some prior knowledge of how political systems work if you are to make an effective contribution.
So my preference lies in the elected part being drawn from the regions rather as Jackie D suggests and then topped up with appointed members and a limited number of political party nominations. It would be a slightly unusual struture but the British constitution has been unusual for a thousand years - so why not!
On this topic see also my original entry of 28th. October under the heading 'The joint committee on the'. (I invented this title when I was still a baby blogger! Now I'm a toddler blogger!)

I want that written constitution...

The UK NEEDS a written Constitution. Draw a line in the sand and let the EU know they can't violate certain rights, certain principles. And please don't make it incomprehensible to all but lawyers and bureaucrats. Maybe much smaller than 200 pages? A sane Constitution.

Yes, you do need to know how things work to be an effective legislator. However, there's no reason why people randomly chosen couldn't be given training. They would also no doubt learn a lot on the job. I bet you now know more about how British politics works than before you became an MP.

Of course Jackie D is right, the written constitution comes before all. I would guess that the lowliest American citizen would say that the first, and perhaps the only, protection against exploitation by politicians and political parties is the constitution. Those who wrote the American constitution surely had only one purpose in mind, the limitation of government powers for all time.

What a contrast with the U.K. ! If I were one of the exploitative urban left-liberal elite, I would be terrified of a proper written constitution, rather as dracula was terrified of the crucifix! Would an objective written constitution allow 650 members of a upper house, or lower house, in our small country? Would it allow the lower house to gerrymander it's composition? Would it hell!

I agree with the comments about a fully appointed House and an elected House. However rather than a part appointed, part elected house, I see a better solution of a process of selection that is part election, part appointments, a democratic appointments panel.

We should form a representative citizen's forum, which can then interview the candidates directly and because they have this personal contact they will elect on merit.

If 4 minutes deciding who to vote for is "broad, but shallow" democracy, then a representative group spending several weeks would be "narrow, but deep".