Oh, my Lord! - political sketch
With everything else going on in the world right now spending half a day of valuable government time in the House of Commons yesterday debating a relatively minor reform of the House of Lords might seem a self-indulgence. Well, removing the remaining hereditary peers from the Upper House was in the Labour Party election manifesto so it seemed a perfectly legitimate debate to have. However, many speakers debating the second reading of the House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill questioned whether it might have made more sense for the government to bring forward a substantive abolition motion rather than what was dismissed by some as mere tinkering. A suspicion was voiced that the bigger issue of abolition would be kicked into the long grass. (Surely not!) For its part, the government responded that as the reform process would inevitably be a lengthy one it had to start somewhere, and where better than with the indefensible retention of the ninety-two hereditary peers decades after refo