The only way in which we can make sense of
Lord Crewe's speech is to suppose that the Government intend to abolish the House of Lords altogether and to set up a Second Chamber which shall have co-ordinate powers with the House of Commons, —a view which is supported by the forecast of the Government scheme given in Thursday's Times. According to this sketch, the Government propose to establish a Second Chamber of a hundred and fifty Members, selected, not by proportional representation, but in seventy-five huge constituencies return- ing two Members each. The new Upper House, or at any rate a large proportion of it, will be elected at a different period from the House of Commons, and when deadlocks take place the difficulty will be solved by the two Houses sitting and voting together. This, of course, is only another and rather clumsy way of saying that when there is a. majority of a certain size in the House of Commons, it is to override at will the opinion of the Second Chamber. Thus by another road we reach in a very large number of cases single-Chamber government.
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