Lord Speaker's speech at the University of Manchester

The Lord Speaker's speech

Thank you. I am delighted to be here in Manchester speaking to you tonight.    

Many of you are doubtless here because of your interest in politics. I have worked in both Houses of Parliament for almost 40 years, so I hope to be able to give you some insight into what that’s like this evening.

However, I didn’t start out looking for a career in politics. I left school early and, after a few different jobs, I studied for a range of qualifications including a degree in chemistry before eventually becoming a Deputy Head Teacher.

After involvement in my local Labour party branch I was selected as the MP for Dumbarton in 1987 and served for 23 years, before becoming a member of the House of Lords in 2010.

But, once a teacher, always a teacher.

The University of Manchester is the birthplace of modern computing and nuclear physics, and the home of Ernest Rutherford, whose pioneering work led to the splitting of the atom.

Eventually, Rutherford was appointed to the House of Lords, making him part of a rich tradition of scientific expertise within the Lords Chamber which remains to this day.

Manchester has not only had a huge impact on the scientific community, but also in our constitutional evolution.

In the nineteenth century this place was the nexus of the industrial revolution. It was a focal point for political radicalism, free trade and intellectual endeavour.

Some of the vital moments in the development of our Parliamentary democracy were played out just moments from where we are speaking today.

And constituencies within greater Manchester have played host to great figures in our political history, including Balfour and Churchill.

Tonight, I want to focus on a subject close to my heart: the importance of Westminster reaching out to all parts of the United Kingdom.

I am all too keenly aware that Westminster can be seen as an institution that is distant from local needs. Every weekend after a busy time in Westminster, I still return home to the place where I grew up in Scotland.

When I was first elected as an MP, my friends questioned why I wanted to go to London – in fact they said to me "You must be off your heid!".

Nearly 40 years later, I am glad to say that I have kept my head.

But the experience I’ve gained between Scotland and London has reinforced ever more firmly my belief that the social, economic and political traditions and life of our country do not, and should not, exist solely in London and the south-east, but extend across the whole UK.

A lot of people talk about the need for reform in Westminster. Across our political system, I believe there is a need to improve the balance between north and south, centre and periphery, London and the regions. How to do this is another question.

I now represent the House of Lords. So what role could we play in restoring the balance?

First let’s just remind ourselves about the role of the House, and then consider how it might help in this respect.

The press tend to focus on the flaws of a few of our members and some of our quirkier traditions. Unfortunately, there is limited wider understanding of what we actually do.

I believe our work, our composition, and our outputs are complementary to the work of the House of Commons, and thereby assist democracy. Let’s say MPs are the university students, and the Bills that they send us are the essays. We provide the 'Peer review', marking the homework.

And for that reason, any reform could impact these carefully balanced arrangements, and should therefore be considered carefully.

But I will come on to that later.

Let me give you some examples of our work, then briefly talk about the benefits of our composition.

The main role of the House of Lords is to check every new draft law proposed by the government, line by line, investigating every implication and considering the consequences of every clause.

About 60% of our time is spent on this and, unlike in the Commons, all changes proposed by members can be debated when considering a Bill.

The Commons simply don’t have the time to do this. MPs are focused on constituency work, party campaigning and (these days) social media. But time on their order paper is also limited and there is a certain cut off point for debates, called a guillotine.

The House of Lords, however, has no time limit when considering legislation.

To take one example from the last session, the Lords considered over 1,200 changes to the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill during 139 hours of scrutiny.

As a result of this the government made changes to the bill, including on climate change mitigations and adaptations in national development policies.

In July last year we completed our examination of the Online Safety Bill. The government accepted several changes to the bill originally put forward by Lords members, on topics including:

• AI-generated content
• age verification to prevent children accessing inappropriate content
• disclosure of information held by service providers,
• and Ofcom guidance on protecting women and girls.

As well as this scrutiny of laws, our select committees are renowned for their detailed analysis of evidence, their expert membership, and the depth of their inquiries.

While Commons committees focus on the work of government departments, Lords inquiries are free to examine the pressing issues of the day while also looking at the long-term complex challenges facing our society.

For example, our digital committee recently urged the UK not to miss out on the potential 'AI goldrush' that could be delivered by large language models like ChatGPT.

Our environment committee focused on the need for more government investment in electric vehicle charging. And we have recently established a new committee to scrutinise financial services regulators such as the Financial Conduct Authority, which have grown in importance in recent years.

The atmosphere in which this work is undertaken also matters.

Since the 2008 financial crisis we have seen an increase in what I call the 3Ps – polarisation, post-truth and populism – and this has been exacerbated by the fallout from Brexit, COVID, and resurgent violence in Europe and the Middle East.

Against this backdrop it is vital that our parliamentary institutions avoid resorting to

• populism – offering easy answers that we know don’t work;
• post-truth – ignoring difficult evidence when it doesn’t fit our preconceptions;
• and polarisation – setting interest-groups against one another.

The House of Commons can be a boisterous place, particularly during PMQs.

But in the House of Lords you rarely hear a raised voice; our debates are characterised by courtesy and respect for all. As a result, we often achieve consensus from all sides around amendments and changes to bills.

When the Lords defeats the government in a vote it understandably grabs headlines. But our bigger impact comes from the amendments passed in the Lords with Government approval.

We see 1,000 or more of these each year. They often represent a minister listening to concerns and objections raised by peers, and revising the Government’s plans in response.

A recent study by the UCL Constitution Unit found that more than half of all changes to Bills originate in the Lords.

This process can be frustrating for ministers but on reflection many of them acknowledge that it helps highlight practical difficulties and prevent unintended consequences. 

The tone and atmosphere of our proceedings is a result of our composition, so let me now consider that.

We are appointed rather than elected. This is both a strength and a weakness.

So the legitimacy of our role in legislating for the nation will always be open to question.

On the strengths of this system, it is helpful to quote what others say. In his recent book, How Westminster Works...and why it doesn’t, commentator Ian Dunt says:

'The Lords has two crucial advantages over the Commons: independence and expertise. That is why it is effective'. In fact, he goes on to say that the Lords is the only part of Parliament that actually works!

Most members of the House of Lords arrive having already fulfilled many of their career ambitions, and are therefore free to pursue their areas of expertise.

In addition, the governing party has no majority in the Upper House, so Ministers must proceed by persuasion and consensus, rather than force of numbers.

The Government needs to win the support of our independent crossbenchers, who comprise around a quarter of the House.

Our benches are home to eminent figures from across the UK: scientists, doctors, judges, business leaders, trade unionists, campaigners for civil liberties and disability rights, environmentalists, academics and engineers.

Their presence reflects the fact that the life of the nation does not reside only in formal political parties, but is also expressed through diverse institutions and organisations.

Consider the membership of our Science and Technology committee. It is chaired by a professor of engineering and includes the Astronomer Royal, a former Director of the Royal Society of Biology, the former Chief Executive of the Environment Agency, a former Minister for Security and a serving Professor of Biodiversity.

The ability to draw on such expertise is a unique advantage of the appointments system.

But there is a case for reform.

There is a need to answer questions regarding the overall size of the House - which is approaching 800 members - and the methods of appointment to the House.

Historically, grand schemes for radical reform of the Lords have failed.

Conversely, incremental, smaller scale reforms, whether through the creation of life peers in 1958, the removal of most hereditary peers in 1999 or the introduction of retirement and expulsion measures 10 years ago - have strengthened and reinforced the work of the House.

There is, therefore, a strong case for examining what could be achieved by further incremental reform.

How could reform help to make our politics less London-centric, and to deliver a UK-wide focus?

The House of Lords – like the House of Commons – legislates not for Westminster or London or the South-East but for the whole of the UK. Our task, as a scrutinising and revising chamber, is to ensure that legislation works well for all of the country.

To demonstrate this, one of my first acts as Lord Speaker was to travel to the devolved parliaments and assemblies in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

I established an Interparliamentary Forum to bring members of these institutions together, with Westminster, to discuss our joint work and shared interests on an equal footing. The Forum continues its work – they held a meeting just this morning.

Our House also has members who have retained deep roots in their home areas.

Here in the north-west we have, among others, Cumbrian broadcaster Melvyn Bragg, the journalist Joan Bakewell, from Stockport, BBC Director-General John Birt, from Liverpool, and former Stockport Council Leader Dave Goddard.

From Northern Ireland we have Arlene Foster, former Unionist Leader Reg Empey, and former SDLP Leader Margaret Ritchie. We have Jack McConnell, who was first Minister of Scotland, and Michael Forsyth, who was Secretary of State, as well as Ruth Davidson, the former Conservative Leader in Scotland. We have a number of members with strong links to Wales, gained across all tiers of government and diverse areas of civil society.

We can, however, still do more to enhance representation of the whole UK in Westminster and I am open to ideas for reform. But my watchword whenever reform is discussed is “First seek to understand” –understand the work the Lords does and understand what impact any proposed change would have on that work.

One proposal is to replace the House of Lords with an elected Assembly of the Nations and Regions.

There are a number of models for regional chambers around the world, but it is far from clear whether any of them would work in the unique conditions of the United Kingdom: A union of four nations within one state.

In Germany, which I visited in January, the upper house is made up of delegations from each of the federal states, giving regional governments a say in decisions on a national level.

But the UK is not federal – we have Parliaments and assemblies in Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast, elected mayors and combined authorities in cities like Greater Manchester and a variety of different tiers of council in other parts of the country. No system of representation could fairly reflect that complexity.

Some have argued that elected members could better represent the interests of the nations and regions in the second chamber.

But we already have a House of Commons with representation from 650 constituencies covering every part of the UK. MPs vote along party lines, rather than as regional groups, and there is nothing to suggest this would be different in an elected second chamber.

Questions have to be asked. If members of the Upper House were to be elected by region, how would seats be allocated between regions?

If they were distributed by population size there is no doubt that England, which comprises over 80% of the UK population, would dominate the new chamber.

If we followed the example of the US Senate and shared out seats equally between regions regardless of population, we would end up with a system in which sparsely-inhabited areas wield disproportionate clout.

And how would we draw the boundaries between regions?

Would someone from Manchester feel they were best represented by a Senator for the North-West from Liverpool or Carlisle?

An elected second Chamber would also pose a challenge to a key strength of our current arrangements – namely that, on the relatively rare occasions when the two Houses disagree on legislation, it is clear to everyone which opinion should prevail – that of the elected House of Commons.

Even if these issues were overcome, we could see the second chamber of parliament become an arena for divisive regional disagreements over resources, rather than a House dedicated to the task of improving the laws governing the whole UK.

This is the role the House of Lords plays, and which it does well.

But incremental reforms could offer an opportunity to enhance the role of the Lords as a UK-wide House, whilst protecting its valuable work and functions.

The fact that the House is appointed could in fact make it easier to address disparities in regional representation, as well as any other disparities including in gender, ethnicity, or other characteristics.

The House of Lords Appointments Commission (HOLAC) was created in 2000 to increase the experience and expertise on the independent Crossbenches.

Since 2012 it has been limited, by a letter of instruction from the then Prime Minister, in the number of independent peers that it can propose for membership of the House.

Might it be possible to release this constraint on HOLAC and – perhaps – give the Commission a renewed focus on monitoring regional imbalances and making recommendations to correct them?

Other ideas are worthy of consideration as part of this debate, such as proposals that places in the Lords could be reserved for holders of particular regional posts, such as elected mayors of our great cities.

Could more also be done to enhance transparency when making new appointments to the House of Lords?

Think of New Years Honours Lists in which Knighthoods, CBEs and MBEs are awarded.

In these lists the city or region where the person is from is always listed.

That is not the case for lists of political appointments to the House of Lords – but perhaps it should be.

If future lists of new peers were broken down into different nations and regions within the UK it would encourage Prime Ministers to think about the overall geographical balance of their nominations to the House.

This exercise in transparency could, over time, have a positive impact upon the composition and representativeness of the Chamber.

My hope is that any Prime Minister considering reform of the House will seek to understand the strengths of our institution. They should also consider the impact of proposed changes on the work of the House and the potential for unintended consequences, including the loss of expertise and independence.

Allow me to conclude with an illustration of what happens when people seek to understand the House. Earlier this week Prospect magazine published an article by Bill Keller, former Editor of the New York Times, giving an outsider’s perspective on the Lords.

The headline – 'A House of ill repute' – didn’t sound promising, and Mr Keller begins by explaining that, when given the assignment, his first thought was of the 'comic potential' of the House.

But he spent some time sitting in our Press Gallery, speaking to members and following our proceedings.

He found - I quote:

'The discussions were sometimes absorbing, like graduate seminars in which everyone has done their homework. Many of the speakers seemed to know what they were talking about, and to listen to one another with genuine curiosity. I can assure you that the debate is rarely so constructive in either house of Congress in the US.'

His conclusion chimes with my earlier remarks regarding the need for the Upper House to complement, rather than challenge, the House of Commons. Mr Keller said:

'If a new government chooses to take on reform, the trick will be to preserve the strengths of the Lords—the diversity of experience, the wariness of dogma, the ability to work across political boundaries, the devotion to the rule of law—so that it complements the unhappy tribe in the Commons without crippling it or—God forbid—replicating it.'

Wise words – indeed, I couldn’t have put it better myself! The House of Lords will continue its work, and those who seek to change it should first 'seek to understand'.

Thank you.