I can see why Salmond would suggest abolishing the House of Lords, but on its own that will fix nothing - and might well even make things worse. The US has an elected upper house, and even more corruption in the system than the UK has, because the problem isnt whether representatives are elected or not. Its partly allowing private donations to party funds and election campaigns. Its also allowing government minister, civil servants and MPs to go and work for firms they were just regulating, deciding on taxation for, or giving contracts to - and also allowing people employed by these firms to take up jobs in the same government departments. Another part is the First Past the Post electoral system which often gives single parties big majorities on a minority of the votes and throws away any vote not cast for the winning candidate in a constituency unrepresented (and the winning candidate can win on the largest minority of the vote, doesnt even need 50%) . And another is the lack of any constitution or law requiring democracy inside political parties. The House of Lords has almost no power. The majority of what it does is to review bills sent to it by the Commons (often badly thought out laws rushed through by the government) and suggest amendments to them. It can do that twice. When it comes to the third time it has to approve them even if the commons has rejected all the Lords amendments. Scrap it and dont replace it and the government can rush through half-arsed laws without any oversight or amendment and frequently no-one will even notice till its too late. Scrap it and replace it with an elected upper chamber, without having fixed all the other problems, and you end up like the US - with either a rubber stamp (if the same party or parties control both houses) or gridlock with almost no laws passed at all (if different parties control the two houses). Im not saying there are no problems with the Lords - how Lords are appointed needs changed. Party leaders shouldnt just be able to hand seats to big donors to party funds, and there shouldnt be hereditary peers, but again, the solution there isnt to have no second chamber. Its to deal with the actual problems. theguardian/politics/2014/dec/20/alex-salmond-peasants-revolt-type-referendum-abolish-house-of-lords
Posted on: Sat, 20 Dec 2014 17:49:25 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015