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Commons vote for a fully elected House of Lords
BillieTheBot
Posts: 8,721 Bot
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6420965.stm
I'm all for it. Though I know many will disagree.
I simply can't see why certain people should have the right to a seat in the Lords simply because an accident of birth, membership of a religion or indeed having given a few fat brown envelopes to a political party.
At least with a fully elected House of Lords it's up to the electorate to fuck things up- and to remedy it at the next election.
I'm all for it. Though I know many will disagree.
I simply can't see why certain people should have the right to a seat in the Lords simply because an accident of birth, membership of a religion or indeed having given a few fat brown envelopes to a political party.
At least with a fully elected House of Lords it's up to the electorate to fuck things up- and to remedy it at the next election.
Beep boop. I'm a bot.
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They're job is to try and curb the inevitable over zealousness of the house of commons and they do quite a good one. If you're having an elected second chamber, and an elected first chamber, then you're going to end up with exactly the same thing and one of them will be a pointless waste.
or do they get an honorary title when they get ellected ?
or perhaps you have to be a lord to begin with to be a candidate?
*knows little of such matters*
I'd like to see Ewan McGreggor in the house of lords, he probably does more for unicef than half the MPs in the commons put together do for all charities
The current House has only a tiny number of hereditary peers, and they were chosen to be there. I'm in favour of half being elected and half being nominated, with each of the three major parties having a third of the nominated seats each.
There would have to be a lot of checks and balances to ensure that it doesn't act as a rubber stamp for the Government without any scrutiny of legislation.
If you're going to have an elected chamber it becomes party political, with whipping etc where one of the strengths of the Lords to scrutinise legislation is that there's so many cross-benchers and even the party appointees are hard to whip as they are in there for life and can't be removed by vengeful party associations for not following the party line.
But then the peer who says 'I'm going to make sure we get free beer for everyone' will get voted in, who's just as stupid as the populist MPs. Getting fed up of the libdems a lot these days actually, they just seem to say what they think people want them to hear.
'Top up fees are bad'. 'Iraq war is bad'. Etc. etc.
To be honest, it's a tricky question that's difficult to get around. Which is why I would nominate Ewan McGregor. You want someone with no party affiliations ideally, but it's nearly impossible.
But letting the public vote is no better.
I would say, why doesn't the Queen just pick some people she thinks are upstanding individuals worthy of protecting the rights and welfare of the people, but you have the problems of despotism then. But the Queen surely doesn't have a vested interest in any of the political parties, she just wants (in theory) what's best for the country doesn't she?
They were discussing this with Tony Benn on the radio today. He reckons (and I agree with him) that it should be called the senate.
Frankly, I see nothing wrong with having an elected second chamber (most other democracies, like America have them), but I think it should be wholly elected on a PR system, keeping the Commons under first past the post.
I was never comfortable with labour's so-called reform (more like vandalism) which removed most of the hereditary peers and replaced them with appointed cronies. We should either have fully-elected or fully hereditary, but not the mish-mash we have now.
In the current system he isn't though- the Party can withdraw the whip from him (as happened with Lord Archer) but he can't be booted out of the House.
Well theoretically yes she does. But it still begs the question, why should the queen get to decide who would run the country best? Why is she any more qualified to make these decisions than anyone else? And why in a democracy
That's why you want an independent panel.
That said once you've nominated someone for the Lords they can't be sacked and you have no hold over them.
Elected Lords will on the other hand continue to be in the pocket of the party - unless you want independent candidates (or independently wealthy to to give them their full title)
Then again there is always hope enough people will vote tactically to redress the balance of power a bit.
have to agree it will probably land up party lists as it will suit all parties more than at the moment, give money to the party, and i suspect strangely youll be moved up the list
id be all for a more democratic house of lords, but it cant be elected as till just be a 2nd house of commons i suggest something more random like say a lottery of the entire voting population
if people just voted for who they thought had the best ideas instead of who has best chance of winning and actually did vote instead of saying i wont bother, things might change since the turnout is so low at the moment
If it is to be elected, it must be for a significantly longer term, 8 or 10 years, that way they would be less liable to be pushed around by the parties.
and it can't be through party lists eithers, as it'll just be another 'give us money and we put you top of list' method
make house of lords a revising and knocking back chambers (at the moment they can propose private members bills in the commons) and make it randoms from around the country i say, or another odd system, say hereditry