REFORMING THE LORDS.

Evening Star, Issue 18022, 17 July 1922, Page 4

REFORMING THE LORDS.

The Marquis of Lincolnshire scoffs at tho proposals of the British Government for reforming the House of Lords. The idform is overdue, since the Parliament Act of 1911, which abridged the power of tho peers, was never meant to bo nioro than a temporary measure. The present Government has been very considerate of the amour propre and the ancient privileges of the titled dignitaries, as was to bo expected from a Government that is mainly Unionist. Though a reformed Chamber is the object which it seeks, it loaves it almost entirely to tho noble lords to effect tho reform themselves. The Bryce Commission, set up in 1917, was much more interfering with, its proposals for a new House, of about 400 members, to be elected largely by members of the House of Commons. But tho resolutions which the present Government has brought down, though they avoid this introduction of new elements into an ancient House and new controllers, make an unwelcome request of the hereditary peers when they ask them to provide so that only half their number shall be eligible to sit there in future. A House of Lords consisting of 350 members, as compared with over 700 who have the right now to sit, might be a great improvement on the present Chamber if the 350 chosen wore the best of the order; but an invidious task is involved in asking the lords, who ft is proposed shall be the electors, to decide who are the best. Repugnant, also, to that great sense of solidarity which peers as well as proletariats can feel is the idea that half tho number of lords would bo deprived of a privilege which they must bo supposed to value, however infrequently, for tho most part, they may care to exercise it. “Half the members of tho House of Lords,” this noble marquis protests, “ aro asked to pole-axe themselves, which is not a neasy thing to do. Does anyone think tho House of Lords would agree voluntarily to knock half its members on the head)?’’ Compliance may be aided by tho reflection that if it docs not, and this Bill is shelved, proposals more obnoxious to hereditary dignity may be made by a later and loss Conservative Go* -vernment, which, would) have the power of

passing them, thanks to the Parliament Act. Meanwhile it has not been shown that the present Upper Chamber, with all the anomalies of its constitution, is a much inferior body to the Commons. The small proportion of members who attend its sittings do their work with real ability, and wjth a quite rare degree' of impartiality as often as class interests ate not concerned. Nor is tho institution so undemocratic as on tho surface it would appear. The British aristocracy, for tho most part, is not so far separated from tho commons. The system which Defoe arraigned still prevails to-day, a blessing as well as a scandal: Wealth (howsoever got) in England makes Lords of mechanics, gentlemen of rakes! Antiquity and birth are heedless here ; ’Tis confidence and money make a peer! Great families of yesterday wo shew, And lords whose parents were the Lord knows who I