Mr Wilson and the Lords

POLITICAL COMMENTARY AUBERON WAUGH

Long before the Queen's speech on Tuesday, everybody knew that the House of Lords was for the chopper. Mr Crossman's leaks had been so heavy and so concentrated that the Torrey Canyon itself must have looked up in envy from its cosy bed on the bottom of the English ChanneL What remains to be seen is whether sufficient oil has now been released to keep the ship afloat in the turbulence ahead this winter.

Something of the powerlessness of our Con- stitution to protect us from the consequences of a violently wrong-headed House of Commons was reflected in the scene at the House of Lords —resplendent, glittering or merely absurd, according to taste—when the Queen read aloud her Government's intentions during the next

twelve months. She. I hasten to add, was un- mistakably glittering in one of her best crowns;

but their Lordships. sitting in peacock finery, could not muster so much as a sneeze when the Speech announced its intention of throwing most of them out into the cold.

A few commentators, studying yet another patch of oil floating away from the Lord Presi- dent, have concluded that hereditary peers will be allowed to elect from among themselves a limited number to sit in the Upper House, on the Scottish principle. The only motive behind this concession must be to maintain the stigma of an hereditary assembly, thus enabling the Commons to deny it the powers of an effective Second Chamber. The Tories will plainly reject this soluion, placing more weight on their hopes for an effective second chamber than on their love of the hereditary system. The Opposition's tactics, in fact, will be fairly straightforward so far as the merits of the proposed reforms are concerned. The only element of uncertainty is in its analysis of Mr Wilson's purpose in trailing this gigantic red herring across the national scene. At this point one must distinguish—and distinguish pretty sharply—between the motives of Mr Crossman in drafting these proposals and the motives of Mr Wilson in allowing them both room and prominence in his programme.

Mr Crossman's main concern in parliament- ary reform—and he admits this quite openly—

is to increase the power and effectiveness of the executive (although he also claims certain liber- tarian instincts which lead him to favour some means whereby the individual may appeal against any application of executive decisions in any particular case. He would like, for example, to see a stronger Ombudsman). It may well be—and he has convinced so many hearers of this that he may even have convinced him- self—that he now believes there is a place inside this scheme of things for a respectable second chamber to revise legislation according to the executive's second thoughts and to introduce legislation approved by the executive. But he has no time whatever for an independent second chamber with powers to impede the executive's will. '

• Mr Wilson; on the other hand, who sees no effective restraint on his own powers under the present system, and might reasonably be rather thankful to see any of his drastic initiatives held Up,sis mainly concerned to provide a minor national diversion, and an inexpensive sop to his left wing. He also, at the bottom of his fossilised radical heart, feels that anything which annoys

the Tory Establishment is distinctly a step in the right direction.

He may hope to keep the Left happy in the face of a possible Rhodesian settlement, or the Right distracted from the full implications of his Enabling Act, but by far the most plausible explanation is that he wants to divert attention as much as possible from our economic predica- ment. Winter unemployment is only one facet of this; the nub of it is that this year's trading figures are going to be even worse than last year's, and next year's possibly worse again.

Awareness of this point is naturally stronger on the Opposition Front Bench in the Commons than it might be in the Lords. The Government has already announced its willingness to break off consultations on Lords reform if the Opposi- tion fails to accept its four basic proposals: that the structure of the House shall be reformed by a severe limiting (if not elimination) of the here- ditary element; that it should undertake much of the Commons' Committee work; that its delay- ing powers should be reduced from twelve to six months; and that the rule should end whereby legislation not completed at the end of a parlia- mentary, session lapses. If the whole exercise is to be interpreted as a diversionary tactic, this threat must be seen as no more than another projection of Mr Wilson's 'dynamic' image. But the Government may be in for a rude shock when it learns just how ready the other side is fbr talks to be broken off—or even to break off talks on its own initiative at the first sign of Government intransigence. Bang goes all our winter's entertainment.

Possibly the Government over-estimates the extent to which the Tory Party loves our House of Lords. Since its abject behaviour on every single issue from Burmah Oil to the postpone- ment of the London borough elections, very few serious politicians in either House have any time for it at all. As one Conservative Front Bench peer put it: 'We have absolutely nothing to lose; we couldn't be worse off than we are at present.' The unalterable Opposition line will be to accept a reformed constitution of the Upper House, thus making it a more respectable body in the performance of its important duties as a second chamber, but to reject any simultaneous reduction in its powers as logically inconsistent. One possible tactic for Mr Wilson, in the face of the Opposition's readiness to walk out of the conference room and thus close the debate, would be to abandon any attempt to diminish the Lords' powers (even in reduced form they would theoretically be sufficient to inconveni- ence a government with a crowded programme) and concentrate instead on reforming their con- stitution in such a way that by limiting the number of seats and appointing the first comple- ment, he would leave Labour with the begin- nings . of a permanent majority in the new, respectable Upper House. This solution would certainly appeal to that impish sense of fun with which he delights to turn the tables on his opponents, as in his frequent appeals to our anointed sovereign during the Rhodesia crisis.

Of course any subsequent Prime Minister could introduce legislation to raise the quota, but by the time we had achieved an Upper House of some 2,000 members even the novelty-mad British public might have had enough.

But it will not be easy for him to construct anything like a Labour-dominated House of Lords from its present ranks while keeping

numbers down to 300 or 350. Although LaboUr

could dominate, by fresh infusions, a House constructed of Life Peers alone—there are already some fifty-seven Labour 'lifers,' against twenty-one Tories—even among Life Peers there are forty-eight who are not aligned with either

party. If existing first creations are added, the Tories come in with a majority of tweny-two, almost certainly supported by a large number of the 150-odd non-aligned. And to add hereditary peers who are also Privy Counsellors would merely give the Tories another twenty votes. Thus out of a House of 352 so composed, 122 would be Tory, 150 would be Liberal, indepen- dent or non-aligned, and a mere eighty would be Labour. In order to achieve even a theoretical balance, Mr Wilson would either have to dis- franchise a large number of Tory peers who are very far from being backwoodsmen, or else raise the total number in the new house to at least 400 by some four dozen creations in his own image.

One may doubt, in any event, whether some reformed Upper House with an in-built Labour majority would be much more courageous in frustrating the purpose of a Tory government than the present, unreformed House is in frus- trating the purpose of a Labour government, but at least something would have changed, and that, it seems is what government is all about. Moreover, our attention would have been diverted, at any rate partially, and at any rate temporarily, from our economic plight.

The Tories' tactics will be aimed at achieving a genuinely independent second chamber with restraining powers on the first. This plea is hope- less, so far as Mr Crossman is concerned; the extent to which it will satisfy Mr Wilson's requirements depends upon the time Conserva- tives are prepared to waste discussing it. Every- thing is to be gained, and nothing lost, by walk- ing out on the consultations as soon as a plaus- ible opportunity presents itself. If the Lords throw the Bill out, as they might well do, despite the efforts of the Conservative Whips, even that perennial optimist Mr Wilson must doubt whether the public would be taken in by a cooked up 'Press versus People' issue in the present state of our national fortunes. Under the prevailing disillusionment with politicians, the People might even side with the Lords.

Which would leave the Tories time to consider their own position. Nobody has yet explained why the hereditary principle, which is held to be self-evidently discredited in a modern parlia- mentary system, is still sacrosanct when applied to the monarchy. Nobody has yet suggested that the Royal Family elect a Sovereign from among themselves. What is to stop the Prime Minister appointing a Life King or Queen from among his ancient backbenchers? There is nothing more inherently ridiculous in the idea of King Manny Shinwell than there is in the idea of Baron Ted Hill. They are both white, and over twenty-one.