Once, I worked on this paper with a colleague who would one day be inheriting a peerage. He was looking forward in the fullness of time to doing his bit in the House of Lords. Alas, Tony Blair nipped that aspiration in the bud when he did away with almost all the hereditary peers. But what struck me was his rationale for them in the parliamentary system; they were, he said, less likely to have their heads turned by power because they had come into parliament after the death of a beloved father and had been educated with their responsibilities in mind. It was a mindset so utterly different from that of every other member of parliament, that it struck me as rather a good thing that the hereditary peers still had influence remaining.
But this week the Commons votes on whether to remove this element of the constitution that has lasted for the best part of a thousand years. At present there are 88 who are eligible to sit in the House of Lords. They sit alongside 692 life peers and 25 bishops. They are, then, a small minority of the Chamber, not likely to unsettle the legislative process, though they can offer an unusual perspective on legislation, that of the landed peerage. They’re unique, except for the bishops, in that they don’t owe their position to political patronage. They are there by dint of birth and beholden to no one.
For that reason alone, I’d keep them. There was an interesting debate today on BBC Radio 4 on the issue between an hereditary earl and Lord (Charlie) Falconer, Tony Blair’s former Lord Chancellor. And Lord Falconer was being very witty about the last vote to replace one of the Labour hereditary peers, which had an electorate of precisely three people, viz, otherLabour hereditaries. But, as the earl pointed out, that was two more than you get in the case of a great many life peers, because there is just one person who normally makes the decision to appoint them, viz, the prime minister. It may be a reflection of the reality of power in our politics, but it’s not what you’d call democratic.
I’ve got to the age now where a number of my contemporaries occupy the high places in the establishment: Oxbridge professors, a judge or two, life peers, bishops. Many deserve their position. And of the system whereby the peers got into the Lords, the best case for it is that it puts in parliament clever people who would never sink to the boring business ofstanding for election. I can, for instance, imagine Lord (Charles) Moore winning a seat if the upper chamber were elected, but I can’t imagine the distinguished historian, Lord (Andrew) Roberts, taking the time to court the votes of the multitude. The House of Lords as it stands is unelected, and would be the poorer if it were elected, being just a replica of the Commons. So why shouldn’t it include a rogue element of peers who are there by right of birth and who therefore offer a unique take on politics, representing continuity rather than continuous change? I’d rather have them than political activists who make a career out of being noisy and self-important.
We do, remember, have an hereditary element in the constitution, right at the top, viz, the Royal Family, and here, if not Australia, the monarchy is surprisingly popular. It is not such a stretch of principle to extend a small proportion of places in the Upper House to peers who are there for exactly the same reason Charles is King, viz, because they were born to it. As it happens, the hereditary peers I have known in the Lords were all rather good value, conscious of the anachronism of their position but determined to bring their experience to the Lords. And being custodians of land and property they do have interesting experience to bring to parliament. They are, moreover, elected by their peers so the inept are weeded out.
The perfection of a constitution would probably be that described in GK Chesterton’s Napoleon of Notting Hill, whereby the absolute monarch was chosen by sticking a pin into the telephone directory (remember that?). But we don’t have a rational system and an elected one would be a) dull and b) a replica of the House of Commons.
So I say, let the hereditary peers stay. They don’t have to invent funny titles for themselves because they’ve got them already, and they add to the gaiety of the nation. Heaven knows, we need more of that.
