How to reform the House of Lords?

Well, it's certainly been a while since anything has exercised me enough to encourage me to write in here, and for all three of my committed followers, I do apologise. Today, however, is the State Opening of Parliament and one of the bills that we are likely to see in the not too distant future is that concerning the reform of the House of Lords, and unlike the majority of the population bored stiff by this debate, I have some views which may prove useful in helping observers come to a decision.

The main issue with Lords reform is that nobody is quite sure what form a new House of Lords should take. There have been all sorts of suggestions concerning the possibility of an entirely elected House, an entirely appointed House, or various permutations on those and its existing structure of 92 Hereditary Peers (including the Earl Marshal and the Lord Great Chamberlain), 26 Lords Spiritual, and the remaining 691 being appointed Life Peers. One of the main topics under discussion is whether, in a democracy, there is any justification for retaining a legislative role for Hereditary Peers, and the overwhelming consensus is that there is not: it is perceived as being undemocratic and "unfair" that some people should have a say in the legislature by virtue of their birth. Furthermore, there is considerably debate about whether appointed peers should remain - indeed the Liberal Democrats want to replace the House of Lords with a fully elected second chamber, and they are the party pushing most heartily fore Lords Reform, primarily because their party is in the doldrums and badly needs a win.

An elected second chamber would, I strongly believe, be one of the poorest constitutional decisions anybody of my generation has ever seen. Firstly, one questions how members should be elected, and if they should be elected at the same time as the House of Commons. Secondly, if they are elected, it will be much more difficult for the Commons to push bills through, as the Lords will be representative and demand a stronger arm on behalf of those who elected them. Would the House of Commons remain senior in that case? And finally, who would actually vote in elections to the Lords? Newspapers spoke rapturously of a return to proper democracy when 65% of the population turned out to vote in 2010 - the highest it had been for a while. If not even two thirds of the population can be bothered to vote in our most important elections, what sort of mandate is an elected second, and less important, house going to have? I would predict a turnout of less than one third of the electorate.

There is a general assumption that democracy is more or less the only acceptable way of choosing a government, and while this does make it less likely that a madman will end up as Prime Minister, democracy is merely an exercise in damage limitation and the exaltation of popularity above policy. It is important to have a mechanism whereby poor leaders can be ejected from the legislative assembly without recourse to civil war, but it does not mean that the system should apply across the board. We can already see that what we in Britain are pleased to call a democratic and representative government has led to huge social divisions and a Parliament crippled by disagreement and backstabbing within the Coalition. Our elected politicians are the worst examples of what may be produced by a democratic system: ineffectual, vain, and committed to winning votes rather than actually running the country properly, and as we are the ones who elected them, it is entirely our fault.

The second option for the Lords is to have an entirely appointed House, filled with members chosen by the House of Commons, ostensibly for their expertise, but almost always in the pursuit of political gain for the Commons. Consider the cash for peerages scandal, or the ludicrous appointment of Alan Sugar to the Lords as Gordon Brown's business czar. To appoint somebody to the Lords because in the popular imagination they embody "business" as a result of being a television personality is bad enough, but that he failed so spectacularly to actually do anything. Lord Sugar retains his seat and since his ennoblement in 2009, has voted a whole 14 times. All appointment results in is a House full of the cronies of the members of the Commons, invalidating its existence as one of the primary constitutional checks and balances.

So election doesn't work, and neither does appointment. How then to compose the House of Lords? I suggest that one of the best aspects of the House of Lords currently is the experience and expertise it lends to the consideration of legislation, often quickly rushed through the Commons and considered only for its political viability. Ideally, this strength would be increased, allowing for as apolitical debate as possible. Experts in their fields must be chosen, and I propose that a good place to start finding such experts is in the 100 chartered professional bodies in the UK. If there were one representative from each who held an office in the Lords for as long as his tenure on the committee of his association lasted, just as the Lords Spiritual currently sit by virtue of their ecclesiastical offices, there would be a constant turnover of expertise in almost every area of activity in the UK. We have also, since the election of the first Mayor of London, seen a remarkable resurgence in civic interest, which raises the possibility of raising the 31 Lords Mayor and Provost in the UK to the Lords, again in a temporary capacity, allowing legislative representation in the Lords for the largest cities in the country.

As far as regards Hereditary Peers, I believe they still have a place in Parliament. The hereditary system is completely arbitrary, and under the present method whereby all people holding a hereditary title elect a proportion of their number to the House of Lords, we have an easy group from which to choose an arbitrary control group. Evidently a nationwide lottery could be held, but that would be extremely difficult to manage and would fail to acknowledge the importance of tradition and history, both of which remain highly valued in the UK. The only problem with hereditary peers is that they tend to be somewhat politically homogeneous, but this leads me to my final suggestion: that we abolish the party system in the Upper House in the pursuit of an advisory chamber unsullied by the political machinations of the Commons, and behaving very much more like the Roman Senate, in that each member is his own mouthpiece, not merely the organ of party-political wrangling.

Messers Cameron and Clegg: I am free for consultation during working hours.