THE SNP last night told David Cameron he should drop plans for an extra 50 peers – most of them Tories – after new research revealed the move would cost millions of pounds.
MP Kirsty Blackman said the report by the Electoral Reform Society confirmed the upper house is a “hopeless waste of public cash” and should be abolished.
The publication comes as the Prime Minister prepares to announce a list of peers, including several Tory donors, that will increase the size of the House to more than 800 members.
Conservative supporter Michelle Mone, the Scottish businesswoman, recently appointed as the UK Government’s business start-ups tsar, is thought to be among the new peers.
Campaigners have renewed calls for Lords reform following the resignation of Lord Sewel last month over allegations he took drugs with prostitutes.
Members of the Lords are not paid a salary but can claim a daily allowance of up to £300 for parliamentary duties as long as they turn up. They have no obligation to speak or vote.
The ERS report said Cameron’s plan would cost at least £1.3 million in allowances and expenses a year and showed that members who did not vote once in the last session claimed £100,000 in expenses. It also found that between 2010 and 2015, £360,000 was claimed by peers during years in which they failed to vote. Just 10 peers were responsible for £236,000 of the costs.
“At a time of austerity, coupled with the renewed public concern about the actions of members of the upper house, it is ridiculous for the Prime Minister to even consider creating dozens of new peers to prop up his government,” said Blackman. “At a cost of £1.3m every year, it would do nothing for public finances or public confidence.”
She added: “Instead of adding more Tory donors, cronies and defeated politicians to the public payroll, what needs to happen is the abolition of the House of Lords.”
Darren Hughes, deputy chief of the ERS, said: “This research completely busts the myths peddled by supporters of an unreformed House of Lords. It shows conclusively that the House of Lords is growing out of control, with the government set on appointing hundreds more peers at a cost of millions.”
Supporters of the Lords say it is a repository of independent expertise and avoids the partisanship of the Commons. But the report found a quarter of appointments to the Lords between 1997 and 2015 were former MPs and more than a third of peers had previously worked in politics.
It also condemned the upper chamber as unrepresentative of modern Britain. There are five times as many peers over the age of 60 as under, and only two are under the age of 39. Just 27 per cent of those appointed between 1997 and 2015 were women.
However, Baroness Flather – a former Tory peer who is now an independent – said the report “missed the point”. She said some cross-benchers, such as herself, rarely vote but still contribute to debates.
“I speak all the time in debates and questions. I became a cross-bencher because I want to speak about issues I know the Tories don’t want me to speak about,” she said. “I might not vote but I am there and I am doing what I think I should be doing. I am not just going in for 20 minutes,” she said.
Both the LibDems and Labour had significant reform of the House of Lords in their manifestos. Labour pledged to replace the House of Lords with a Senate of the Nations and Regions, while the LibDems pledged to almost halve the number of peers to 450 and have elections by 2020.
A Downing Street spokesman said: “It is important the House of Lords in some way reflects the situation in the House of Commons.”
A House of Lord spokeswoman said: “The House of Lords has a crucial role in scrutinising government and improving legislation. A Member can claim the daily attendance allowance for each day they attend a sitting of the House and undertake parliamentary work or attend a Select Committee meeting as a Member of that Committee.”
Letters to the National, August 17: It's time for radical reform of the Lords
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