The Earl of Dundee (Con)

My Lords, I refer to Amendment 76 in my name. Its effect is to make a distinction between non-parliamentary and parliamentary peerages. Political patronage, along with awarding other honours, would continue to create non-parliamentary peerages but no longer those which confer a parliamentary right to sit in the House of Lords. As a result, conversely, a parliamentary right to sit in the House of Lords would be decoupled from political patronage. To that extent, Amendment 76 connects to other amendments to this Bill on the future composition of the House of Lords. These include: first, a revised role for HOLAC to appoint within a reformed House of 600 temporal Peers one-third—or 200—as non-political Cross-Benchers; secondly, the setting up of an electoral college representative of all parts of the United Kingdom to indirectly elect 400 political Members, or two-thirds of a reformed House; and, thirdly, the establishment of different membership group numbers in order best to ensure the continuity of our present very high standard of legislative scrutiny and revision. In a reformed House, this would be done by having the non-political Cross-Benchers in the majority, with 200 temporal Members—50 more than either the government or opposition parties, which would have exactly 150 political Members each, while other political and temporal Members, including the Liberal Democrats, would number 100. Amendment 76, therefore, is in the context of a continued high standard of legislative scrutiny in a reformed House. It is achievable, provided that, as a first step, the right to sit and work in the House of Lords becomes decoupled from political patronage.