James Graham (Unlock Democracy): The latest Lords reform white paper is both a step forward and a step back. It is positive in that for first time ever an official government document is unambiguously in favour of second chamber which is either mostly or fully elected. It also nails the lie about an elected second chamber being a threat to Commons primacy:
The Government welcomes a confident and assertive second chamber. It sees this as further enhancing our democracy and something that is entirely consistent with the primacy of the House of Commons. That primacy rests in the fact that the Government of the day is formed from the party or parties that can command a majority in the House of Commons. It also rests in the Parliament Acts and in the financial privilege of the House of Commons. The Prime Minister and most senior ministers are also drawn from the House of Commons. A more assertive second chamber, operating within its current powers, would not threaten primacy.
The significance of this is impossible to over-estimate. Despite the fact that the constitutional situation has been crystal clear for some time, rancour about primacy and powers has frequently derailed the debate over Lords reform. There is considerable pressure on the government, not least from the House of Lords itself, to just drop this issue and it is to their considerable credit that they are continuing to press ahead. Of course it would be nice if they made faster progress, but the fact there is progress at all is remarkable following the mess we were in a few years ago.
Where the white paper takes a step back however is the decision to reconsider whether or not to elect the second chamber by the first past the post system, in the face of all previous white papers and other reviews. As long ago as 1997 and the Cook-Maclennan agreement, Labour has worked on the principle that "no one political party should seek a majority in the House of Lords." The Wakeham Report insisted that any elected element of the second chamber should use proportional representation. The Cunningham Report echoed this. In response to the criticism that political parties can dominate party lists, 2007's white paper proposed a "partially open list system." This was the context behind last year's Commons vote and so going back to square one is a little bemusing.
But revisiting this issue is not necessarily a bad thing. Significant numbers on the Conservative benches have continued to murmur about this and it is arguably time we brought the debate out in the open once and for all. In doing so, we can expose quite how dreadful an idea a first past the post-elected second chamber really would be.
To start with, it needs to be pointed out that first past the post (FPTP) is not an alternative to a closed list system, but is the ultimate closed list system - an inconvenient truth that many like to pretend otherwise about. This point was most forcefully made as long ago as the 1997 election when Martin Bell defeated Neil Hamilton in Tatton. The fact that it requires a celebrity independent, backed by two of the three main parties and a nationwide media profile, to hold an MP in a safe seat to account is a serious indictment. Every time you hear a supporter of first past the post pontificating about the evils of closed list systems, remember this.
Jack Straw has already conceded the need for semi-open lists and if we are really serious about giving people rather than parties the final say over which candidates should be elected two alternatives are readily available: single transferable vote (STV) and open lists. Supporters of closed list-FPTP should not be allowed to push in the opposite direction while claiming to be democrats.
But closed list-FPTP wouldn't just be the worst elected option, it would be worse than a fully appointed Lords. The Conservatives still pay lip service to the idea of a politically balanced second chamber in which no party has a majority and have greatly benefited from one over the past 8 years. However, a second chamber elected by closed list-FPTP would normally lead to a party having a majority in both houses. Its role would be to change from parliamentary check to parliamentary cheerleader.
If the proposals in the white paper for members of the second chamber to be elected in thirds for 12-15 year terms were implemented, the situation would be even worse. With such a system, Tony Blair at the height of his popularity in 1997 would have been frustrated at every turn by a second chamber with a Conservative majority dating back from Margaret Thatcher's 1987 victory. By contrast, the current deeply unpopular Labour administration would be able to get whatever it liked through the second chamber thanks for Blair's successive election victories. Frustrating fresh new administrations whilst bolstering tired and festering ones would be perverse and profoundly anti-democratic. We should marvel for a second that there is even a single MP calling for this.
All these points are hinted at, in rather less judgmental language, in the new white paper itself. It is clear that this return to debating electoral systems is a result of deadlock between the parties. Quite why the Conservatives continue to cling to an electoral system which denies choice and competition - things which the party is all too keen on in other areas - is an anomaly for historians to ponder in the centuries ahead. In the meantime, democratic reformers cannot afford to miss this opportunity to once again demolish their arguments. But with the vested interests of parliamentarians being what they are, it is doubtful that this deadlock can be bypassed by mere argument. If ever there was a policy area which would benefit from the government's new "engagement agenda" it is this one.
Finally, if we are to revisit this, and reform itself has been postponed for at least two years, then the government has missed a trick in not reviewing the electoral system for the House of Commons at the same time. The Ministry of Justice's review of electoral systems concluded earlier this year that: "it is clear that the voting system for the House of Commons should not be considered in isolation from proposals for a substantially reformed House of Lords." If that is true then it clearly cuts both ways.
Earlier this week the Electoral Reform Society and Labour Campaign for Electoral Reform were debating whether Parliament should operate by "Aussie Style Rules" - i.e. STV for the second chamber and the Alternative Vote for the first. That is certainly one option, although in my view the case for both houses to be elected by proportional systems remains compelling.