House of Lords Bill [HL]

My Lords, I am rather enjoying myself. This is exactly the sort of debate that I would expect to get from a mutual admiration society interested in self-preservation—light touches, nothing serious and nothing of any merit at all. I have been here only since 1963 and therefore have spent 47 years of, I could say, wasted time. In that time, I began part of my career in the research world, doing the Labour Party’s research on reform of the Lords in 1968. Ever since then I have kept a sort of walking dictionary in my head of what we have here—740 members sitting on average 600 hours a day, 400 days a year, 40 per cent of the time based on scrutiny and 60 per cent of the time on revising legislation. That is not a bad set-up, but how did they all get in? I made a mistake last time and misconstrued something. Are we democratic? The answer is no. Are we undemocratic? Probably not. But is it worth it, and what do we actually cost? The Lords costs roughly £121 million a year, while the Commons is £388 million a year, which is not a very large amount. Even if there were tiny annual losses by just one bank, those would be in excess of it.