Jenny Jones rightly argues that removing the hereditary peers from the House of Lords is “just a tweak” (I sit in the House of Lords – and here’s why getting rid of 92 hereditary peers won’t fix it, 10 September). Sadly, she concludes by regurgitating the Gordon Brown proposals for an elected second chamber.
Those proposals did not include restoring the pre-1911 right for the Lords to block the Commons. Their real purpose can be divined from the Lords’ second reading debate on the last government’s Rwanda bill. Labour did not force a vote, even though repeal was Labour policy. Why? Was it because Labour and the Tories want to keep the absolute power they enjoy in turns: the appearance of a democratic second chamber without any substance?
