James Somerville-Meikle writes: With some of Boris Johnson’s picks for peerages raising eyebrows, Labour has taken the initiative this week by saying it would abolish the House of Lords. The unelected second chamber is something of an anomaly, but would the quality of law making be improved by getting rid of their lordships? On Tuesday this week I attended a Committee stage debate on the Public Order Bill in the House of Lords. For over three hours, peers debated a Clause relating to buffer zones at abortion clinics, which had been hastily added to the Bill by MPs in the Commons. Clause 9 would make it illegal to do pretty much anything that “expresses opinion” within 150 meters of a facility providing abortions, with a penalty of up to 6 months in prison. The Government has already acknowledged that the wording of Clause 9 is incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights, and so the House of Lords has the job of tidying up the legislation. One peer quipped that they had spent more time debating Clause 9 than MPs had done on the entirety of the Bill in the Commons. If the Lords are replaced, Labour needs to think about how scrutiny of Bills can be retained.
