The House of Lords is bursting at the seams and a collection of the great and the good plea for a moratorium on the creation of new peers.

The swollen House of Patronage now has 831 members with 792 able to attend and vote.

Meg Russell’s excellent paper (see attachment below) reminds us that Lords reform is very much unfinished business. But, easier said than done.

Patronage and cronyism pollute our politics and the sooner we get rid of an unelected Upper Chamber the better.

I learn that David Cameron is responsible for the creation of 117 peers.

He is told to stop or risk destroying the institution.

My advice is: carry on.

It’s probably the only way to get Lords Reform in my lifetime.

In 1980, Tony Benn called for the creation of a thousand peers so that they could vote for the abolition of the House of Lords and the creation of an elected Upper House.

It was splendid rhetoric but, at the time, considered a bit fanciful.

Thirty years on, if that’s what it takes, go for it!

And the Canadian Senate

Here in Canada, the Ottawa Parliament also has an unelected Upper Chamber with a modest (by comparison) 105 members and a retirement age of 75.

And, of course, it has its fair share of felons. (Senator Raymond Lavigne has been convicted of fiddling his expenses and is to be sentenced next month.)

The Conservatives promise term limits and, in due course, an elected Senate.

The NDP want abolition.

And the Liberals and the Greens are shamefully silent in their election manifestos.

This is no time for sitting on the fence.

Rimat Akhmetov

So, London’s most expensive flat was sold to the Ukraine’s richest man, the 44 years old oligarch, Rimat Akhmetov.

Apparently, he is the 39^th richest person in the world, worth around £10 billion.

All acquired perfectly legitimately, I’m sure.

Cough! Cough!

Akhmetov’s decision to shell out £136 million on One Hyde Park comes at a time when Governments around the world are pledging £480 million towards the cost of a huge steel sarcophagus designed to seal the Chernobyl nuclear reactors, in his native Ukraine, for the next 100 years.

£480 million sounds like a lot of money but, of course, it is all relative.

The UK’s contribution of £50m, which I consider generous, wouldn’t cover the cost of Akhmetov’s renovations to the flat and the interior design.

MPs are “potted plants”

The Toronto Star, in a splendid editorial, calls for an end to MPs who are “potted plants”.

I agree.

Whether in Canada or the UK, MPs are more powerful than they think they are.

If only they would speak out.

We’ve got to get away from the “Bob Ainsworth strategy” where MPs only say what they really believe after they have been sacked or kicked out by the voters.

By then, of course, no one gives a toss what they think.

Attachments:

House Full.pdf	[House Full. a report on the House of Lords. Meg Russell]	427 Kb
Its My Party.pdf	[It's My Party]	1647 Kb