I never thought I'd side with Britain's poshest people, but they're being used |
Life catches you out. Here I am, a socialist, empathising (a bit) with some of the most generationally privileged people in this nation. Last week, the House of Lords Hereditary Bill was passed. It rids us of the last 92 peers whose seats are passed on from father to son. The Tories fought ferociously to keep them in. Deals were done. The bill passed.
The Leader of the Lords, Labour’s Baroness Smith said this fulfilled her government’s manifesto pledge that “no-one should sit in our Parliament by way of an inherited title”. And now they won’t. And I am thinking, do these peers, some hapless, really represent the only problem of legitimacy in the Lords? Or are the doomed peers being showcased to display Labour’s dusty egalitarian values, and – more seriously – to divert us from the actual scandals that have, for the longest time, sullied the second chamber?
Lord Hamilton is a soundly upper-class life peer, whose father was bequeathed his seat. In his speech defending the forever peerages, Hamilton warned, the House would be left with “nothing other than political chancers, like me, and donors and members of the blob of one sort or other”. The pomposity and false modesty are irksome; his class loyalty crude and distasteful, but Hamilton’s observations about many appointees are incontestable.
The system is terribly flawed. All parties know that, but do nothing to change it. Beware though, of Hamilton’s scorn which he casts liberally and widely.
The Lords does have many hardworking, insightful peers. We don’t hear enough about them. My list would include Baroness Helena Kennedy, Baroness Martha Lane-Fox, the indefatigable defender of refugees, Lord Dubbs, Lord Hain, Baroness Harman – all Labour. I also respect the Conservatives’ Rosa Monckton, a valiant campaigner for disabled children, the economist Dambisa Moyo, and Ruth Davidson. And the Lib Dems’ Meral Hussein-Ece and crossbencher Simon Woolley.
I was recently at a memorial lunch in the Lords for Lord Meghnad Desai, a globally respected economist. There in the beautiful dining room were some admirable Lords and Baronesses. And a few who were, indeed chancers and donors. As are many others.
I know two Tories and one Lib Dem, who paid to get into the Lords. Another one, a Labourite, died some years ago. He planned the journey meticulously, lobbying for honours and getting them, donating cash to Labour, until he was nominated for a peerage. Cash for peerages are part of the history of the place, a tradition if you will. The others are patronage and networks. Which is why few nurses, social workers or teachers get in.
Several people got in because one of the political parties owed them or needed favours from them. Journalists, editors and media owners promoting the Tories in their heyday were gifted this role. Brexit maniacs were another job lot. Boris Johnson put his brother Jo in and a young, unknown woman called Charlotte Owen.
Blair handed peerages for services to his agenda. Cameron did the same, profligately. Covid revealed the rot in the appointments system. Lady Michelle Mone, a Cameron appointee who allegedly got millions of pounds to make useless Covid protective products, has, so far, escaped accountability; Lord Chadlington has just retired from the House of Lords, after being found to have breached its code of conduct. He helped a subsidiary of a company he chaired to secure PPE contracts. Last November, Lord Dannatt, previously head of our armed services, and Labour’s Lord Evans were suspended for a few months for offering parliamentary access for “payment or reward”.
Starmer wants Mandelson to leave the Lords, but cannot strip Mandelson of his title. Peers are a protected species.
The culture in the Lords facilitates this sense of superiority and latitude. Soon after the Lib Dem peer Lord Lester was suspended for the sexual harassment of a female Asian founder of a domestic violence charity, a female peer told me that to maintain the honour of the House, recalcitrant peers were respected, no matter what.
The appointments of Charlotte Owen (a former No 10 adviser), Jo Johnson and Lady Mone, unquestioned and still sailing free; now Peter Mandelson, are destabilising the Lords. The old ways cannot survive. What would reform look like?
A second elected chamber would only replicate the tribalism of the Commons.
The Lords must institute a fair and transparent appointments process, no cash for peerages, no peerages for political favours, no cronyism. In 2000, Blair introduced the “People’s Peers”. You could apply, provide references, be interviewed. it worked. The legal legend, Elizabeth Butler-Sloss got in that way. So too, Victor Adebowale, a passionate advocate for homeless people. Why not make that the only way into the Lords?
And when peers behave badly, they should be named, shamed, and ejected. And charged and tried. Ermine and strange traditions are corrupting democracy and justice. That can’t go on.