House of Lords Bill [HL]

My Lords, I am delighted to speak in support of the Second Reading of this Bill. I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Steel of Aikwood, for the timely Bill and for the manner in which it is framed. Yesterday, the Bill was dismissed, first, as not providing a comprehensive reform and, secondly, it was described as ““interesting””. It is clear that there never was any intention that the Bill would provide for a comprehensive reform, and I think it deserves better than to be described as just interesting. The Bill is important; it is timely; it is necessary; and it has the potential to be historic. In addition to providing for a very sensible solution to the continuing by-elections for hereditary peers, the Bill provides a mechanism to put the Appointments Commission on a statutory basis and to deal with a number of matters which have damaged this House and the whole of the body politic. We are all scarred by media speculation and comment about matters such as alleged cronyism and topical matters such as alleged cash for peerages. I thought of all the things that my noble friend Lord Lipsey said. I thought of saying them but perhaps I did not have the bottle to be quite so blunt—but I agree with everything that he said. We cannot wait until 2014 when there is, I believe, a great groundswell of support for the Bill. The Government should do more than just take note, and should provide time for its passage on to the statute book.