Life Peers

I think a coronet would really suit me.
Actually I have better things to do than debate with a load of old people who are resting on past laurels.
(Sounds quite uncomfortable come to think of it)

Read what?

click on 'this' - it is 'blued', but it's sometimes difficult to make out the difference between the blue and the black print.

Ah, yes I can see it now! Jingl was right - it is hard to make out the blue sometimes.

I googled 'Peers attendance allowance' and found this:

Financial support for members explained

Most members do not receive a salary for their parliamentary duties but are eligible to receive allowances and, within certain limits, the travel expenses they incur in fulfilling their parliamentary duties.

Members who are not paid a salary may claim a flat rate attendance allowance of £150 or £300 for each sitting day they attend the House. This daily allowance replaces the separate overnight subsistence, day subsistence and office costs in the previous system. Entitlement is determined by attendance, not residence criteria.

Members who receive a ministerial or office holders' salary are not entitled to claim the allowances based on attendance.

Peers have been recorded signing on for the allowance and leaving immediately (just like Glenys Kinnock did at the EU). But don't forget -we are all in it together!

We don't need 600 odd commoners and even less do we need 900 even odder peers. This is just absurd and I think sooner or later people will be so pissed off that they will take to the streets. I certainly hope so. And no, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see Lord Blair of al-Basrah in the House of Lords.

Do you think he has given up hope of getting the top job back?

Oh, I do hope so, Greatnan. We don't want an even more right-wing government. Maybe I will go and put a bet on Blair getting a peerage by the end of next year. Wonder what odds they would give me...

I remembered something about Wilson's mate, Lord Kagan so I googled it. Very strange - his knighthood was taken away, but not his peerage after he served 10 months in jail for fraud.

So lets get this straight! Peers could just get £300 a day for dozing on the benches of the House of Lords and not have to contribute anything.

I bet W S Gilbert (and Sullivan) would have had something to say about that.

Yes, and I think it applies to the bishops too!

Nelliemoser Isn't the House of Peers the one that W. S. Gilbert described as "doing nothing in particular and did it very well"?

The majority of life peers are chosen because they are eminent in their field and can contribute a lot to discussions in the House of Lords because they understand many of the subjects as they have spent a lifetime in the relevant profession. At various times I have listened to the House of Lords discussions on the radio and TV and been impressed by the depth of experience and knowledge shown by its members, incuding several with severe disabilities that would make being n MP impossible. One life peer, who speaks frequently and works for the disabled actually took a 'speaker' with her to read her speech as her diabilites made it to difficult for her to do anything other than read the opening and closing paragraphs.

What i would like to see is more peers of this kind and fewer political peers.

How many hereditary peers are value for money, I wonder.

absent That's the clue I needed. I was trying to find the lyrics, I had narrowed it down to Iolanthe.

When Britain really ruled the waves
(In good Queen Bess's time) ,
The House of Peers made no pretence
To intellectual eminence
Or scholarship sublime ;

Yet Britain won her proudest bays
In good Queen Bess's glorious days..
Cho. Yes, Britain won, etc.

When Wellington thrashed Bonaparte,
As every child can tell,
The House of Peers throughout the wat
Did nothing in particular.

And did it very well ;
Yet Britain set the world ablaze
In good King George's glorious days.
Cho. Yes, Britain set, etc.

And while the House of Peers withholds
Its legislative hand,
And noble statesmen do not itch
To interfere with matters which

They do not understand,
As bright will shine Great Britain's rays
As in King George's glorious days.
Cho. As bright will shine, etc.

Good old W S Gilbert
With that I am to bed.

The House of Lords is a mash up isn't it.
Difficult to know how one would construct a new one, if given a blank sheet.
Needs more than a few scientists to counteract the lack of them in the lower house, that's for sure.
My DH had a meeting with a hereditary peer once. Minor ministerial role. Verdict: "mad as a fish"

When a prime minister wants to get rid of a useless MP he/she is sent to the House of Lords, where they continue to be useless.

FlicketyB While I don't doubt that some life peers are chosen because they are eminent in their field, I think many others are chosen for completely different reasons, not that I am suggesting that political donations and old boy network come into it.

Wasn't there some talk of giving Denis Thatcher an hereditary title so the egregious Mark could inherit it?

Well somehow he has managed to become Sir Mark Thatcher.

Wasn't the Sir for Mark Thatcher for being implicated in dubious arms deals or a coup or something. Cynical

No – Dennis was made 1st Baronoet Thatcher, a title which Mark has inherited as second Baronet Thatcher. Mrs Thatcher was adamant that Dennis should be given an inheritable title as she was besotted with her wretched son.

WS Gilbert, in the Gondoliers had his 'Kings of Barataria' make everyone a peer so that 'they all shall equal be'. Perhaps that's the way things are going!

annodomini

"He wished all men as rich as he,
And he was rich as rich could be,
So to the top of every tree
Promoted everybody."