The House of Lords in a Contemporary UK Poliitics

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INTRODUCTION Britain is a vigorous, creative and dynamic country. Its people are inventive, talented and diligent. They deserve a framework for their country which reflects the unique character of the place and the people. Parliament is where the will of Britain's people is expressed: where the temper, direction and course of our country is set. Parliament is the core of political accountability in Britain, where the decision of the electorate to support a published programme of policies is transformed into legislation, into consideration of the opportunities and difficulties facing the nation, and into leadership in government. But for Parliament to carry out these functions, it must rest on the assent of the people of Britain. To sustain that, it must carry out its work with authority, and with integrity. In recent years, both the authority and integrity of Parliament have been questioned, and its representativeness subject to ever-closer scrutiny. Parliament itself has taken steps to respond to this challenge to its role and performance, by improving its standards and examining its practices. The Government believes that Britain, like other large mature democracies, needs a two-chamber legislature. While other major democracies show a wide range of variation in how they form their second chambers, a second chamber is a feature of almost all of them. But the second chamber must have a distinctive role and must neither usurp, nor threaten, the supremacy of the first chamber. Ensuring that the principal democratic mechanism of Britain ¬ the House of Commons ¬ works in the best possible way is important. The ability of the elected Government to fulfil its electoral contract with the British people and deliver what they have asked it to do primarily depends on the proper performance of the House of Commons, but it rests too on an effective and balanced second chamber ¬ the House of Lords. While the House of Commons clearly reflects the wishes of the people, and so is the source of both legitimacy and power of the elected Government, the House of Lords has an important role as a significant element in the legislative process. The House of Lords cannot be immune from change. The House of Lords needs to adapt and modernise. The House of Lords has a number of functions within Parliament ¬ considering and amending legislation, questioning the Government through debates and questions to Ministers, debating matters of public interest and carrying out specialist investigations through select committees of the House. These are all important jobs for a second chamber, and the increasing volume and complexity of Government work and Government legislation means that both the workload of the House of Lords is increasing and its contribution to the legislative process is greater. The most distinctive and important role of the present House of Lords is the specialist expertise and independent perspective it can bring to the scrutiny of legislation. But the House of Lords and the work it carries out suffer from its lack of legitimacy, because the presence of the hereditary peers creates a permanent, inbuilt majority for a single party. For its functions to be properly performed, the House of Lords needs a degree of legitimacy which it does not now enjoy. This limits the extent to which it can make a proper contribution as a second Parliamentary chamber. Reforming the House of Lords is a key element of the Government’s legislative plans, and proposals for further reform go beyond that. I am convinced that many of the key institutions of Britain are amongst the best in the world. They have developed ¬ many of them over centuries ¬ in ways which catch the character of Britain and the British people: a character rooted in fairness, in decency and in democracy. They have changed throughout their history: they will continue to change, now and in the future. All institutions need to modernise to maintain their impact, their importance and their integrity. Reform of the House of Lords is long overdue. For too long, hereditary peers with no democratic legitimacy, whose role is based on birth and not merit, have been able to play a part in passing laws affecting everyone in Britain. For too long, Britain has got by with a second Parliamentary chamber which is less good than it could be. For too long, governments in Britain have shirked the responsibility of reform. In my course paper I will look at the key functions of the House of Lords . Also, it will be discussed how the role of the Second Chamber has changed throughout history and to understand why the House of Lords has been reformed for several times, it’s necessary to know a bit about the historical development of the Lords. CHAPTER I EVOLUTION OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS The UK legislature is bicameral, that is, consisting of two chambers: the House of Commons and the House of Lords. Until 1999, the House of Lords was the largest legislative body in the world, comprising - in theory - about 1200 members. Many of these members were holders of hereditary peerages - the result of honours conferred by kings on their ancestors. Then in 1999 the House of Lords Act swept away the power of most hereditary peers to vote. This was supposed to have been the first step in a larger program of reform, but the next steps proved harder to take than the Government expected. The House of Lords is the original chamber of Parliament, predating the Commons. Its origins can be traced back to Saxon times, when it was the custom of the king to call the leading men of the country to advise him at court. In the two centuries after the Norman conquest, the irregular meetings of the English kings and their barons and bishops - the aristocracy of the day - developed into a form of parliament that we would recognise. In the 11th century, the king was advised and supported primarily by the Curia Regis, or King’s Court, comprised of these aristocrats. We do not know in detail how this baronial assembly gave way to a more representative form of parliament, but it seems clear that by the middle of the 12th century the shire courts - the early manifestation of regional democracy - were being asked to send representatives to the King’s Court . There were a number of reasons why kings would need to seek the consent and advice of regional representatives, not least of which was that they relied on the shires for raising finance. Another reason for the king to summon regional representatives to the Court was to balance the power marshaled by particular factions of the aristocracy. One of these factions, led by Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, probably precipitated the first recognisable modern parliament. The so-called ‘model parliament’, was summoned by Edward I in 1265. It consisted of two knights from each shire, two burgesses from each borough, and two citizens from each city, in addition to the King and the aristocrats of the Court. This parliament was specifically called to settle constitutional disputes between the King and de Montfort, but the same form of parliament became the rule from the beginning of the 14th century. We can see here the origins of the Lords/Commons divide that makes up the modern Parliament. In the 11th and 12th centuries, barons were summoned to the Court sporadically, at the whim of the king. In the early 14th century, there developed the notion of ‘peerage’, that is, the right to sit in Parliament as a member of the Court. The first recognisable hereditary peerage was granted in a ‘barony by patent’ to John Beauchamp in 1387; this barony carried a right to sit in Parliament; the right was to descend to male heirs. By the early 15th century, the majority of the aristocratic part of Parliament was hereditary. By the 15th century we have a recognisable bicameral Parliament. The ‘Upper House’ consisting of hereditary peers, descended from people honoured by the king, and a ‘Lower House’, consisting of representatives of the community. The next two hundred or so years of stable Parliamentary composition saw an increase in the power of Parliament against the king; these developments culminated, of course, in the civil wars of the 17th century. By the end of this period the notion of Parliamentary Sovereignty was firmly enshrined in the Bill of Rights, along with a constitutional limit to the power of the monarchy.The House of Lords was abolished for a short time under the administration of Cromwell, but was eventually restored along with the monarchy. Between the 18th and 19th centuries, the Commons became the dominant power in Parliament, largely because it controlled taxation. By controlling taxation it controlled finance, and by controlling finance it controlled government. During this period the party system of government developed, and it became reasonable to refer to the party in the Commons with the majority as the Government. The Reform Act of 1832 led the Lords to accept that it would not, and indeed could not, stand against the Commons when it represented the unequivocal view of the populace. However, it could assert that the only way the will of the people could be determined was by a general election. 1.1. Reform Measures Since 1900-1999 Matters came to a head in 1906 when the Lords rejected social reform measures proposed by the Liberal Government of Lloyd George and supported by the Commons. In 1907 the Government proposed measures to limit the power of the Lords, which responded by vetoing the 1909 Finance Bill. This was a particularly confrontational step; remember that the Lords had a 500-year tradition of not interfering with money Bills. Even after two general elections in 1910 had returned the same Government to power, the Lords was not prepared to accept the proposed limitation on its powers. The Lords were compelled to accept the 1911 Parliament Act, which removed the power to veto a money Bill altogether, and reduced the power of veto in other matters to a power to delay for two years. Even this reduced power of veto allowed the Lords to disrupt the progress of Bills proposed in the last two years of a Parliamentary term, as it could seek to delay the legislation beyond the end of the Parliament. This was a particular problem in 1945 when the new Labour Government wanted to carry out a significant program of nationalisation against the wishes of the Lords. It therefore had to invoke the 1911 Act to introduce the 1949 Parliament Act, which reduced the delaying power of the Lords to one year. Under the Parliament Acts, Bills must still be considered by both Houses, but if the Lords delays its approval for more than a year, the Bill can be enacted without it. Another important move was the enactment of the 1958 Life Peerages Act. This allowed the monarch, usually at the request of the Commons, to create peerages for life. This reform was first proposed by Prime Minister Salisbury as early as 1880. By creating life, rather than hereditary, peerages, it was hoped that the size of the House of Lords could be brought under control. This move has not been without its own problems, as we shall see. The Labour Government of 1966 came to power with a manifesto pledge to reform the Upper House. Its proposals included the abolition of hereditary peerage, and a limitation of the size of the House to 230 voting members. Existing hereditary peers could continue to sit as non-voting members for the time being. Controversially, the measures guaranteed the Government of the day a majority in the Upper House (albeit a small one) by granting it the power to nominate most of the voting members. These proposals were accepted by the Lords, but rejected in the commons by both the Conservative opposition and Labour’s own back-benchers. More moderate objectors claimed that there were no provisions to prevent the Upper House becoming the object of political patronage. With the Government free to guarantee a majority, the Lords would lose its ancient power to moderate the behaviour of the Commons. When the reforming Bill was debated on the floor of the House of Commons in 1968, the objection was so fierce, and the number of amendments tabled so large, that it took eleven days to debate the first five clauses. The Government eventually withdrew the Bill altogether. No serious challenge was mounted to the House of Lords again until the Labour government of 1997. 1.2. The 1999 Reforms In 1997, the present Labour Government came to power with a pledge to reform the House of Lords. Labour’s proposal had two stages. In the first, the powers of hereditary peers were to be abolished. In the second, there would be wide consultation on the future composition and powers of the Lords, with a view to implementation of definite reforms within two Parliamentary terms. Although there was disquiet about whether it was a good idea to abolish hereditary peers without deciding what to replace them with, the 1997 Government had something it had never before enjoyed: a huge Parliamentary majority. It was further spurred into action by the Lords’ repeated rejection of the European Elections Bill. Thus, despite widespread misgivings, the 1999 House of Lords Act abolished all but 92 hereditary seats. At the same time, the Government appointed a Royal Commission, chaired by Lord Wakeham, to consider the long-term future of the Lords. The Wakeham Commission's report was largely adopted in the Government’s White Paper of 2001. This advocated an Upper House with 120 elected members and the rest - about 400 - to be appointed. It also recommended the expulsion of the remaining 92 hereditaries. In brief, the composition of the Lords - primarily nominated by the Government - provided no confidence that the new body would have real legitimacy and authority. Moreover, it was clear that very few people on either side of the debate were happy about the notion of a hybrid House - part selected, part elected. Public opinion polls overwhelmingly supported the introduction of a directly elected House, but the Government was opposed to this development - and remains opposed. The Government therefore announced the formation of a cross-party consultation committee, and eventually, a free vote in both Houses on the proportion of the Lords that would be directly elected. But even the Government could not agree amongst its own membership how the reforms should go forward. The Prime Minister and the Lord Chancellor eventually came down in favour of a wholly selected House, while the Leader of the Commons - Robin Cook - openly campaigned for it to be mostly elected. Mr Cook was supported by a majority of Labour back benchers, and - surprisingly perhaps - the Conservative front benches. When the vote was held the Commons rejected all the proposed compositions of the Upper House. 1.3. The Make up of the House of Lords The structure of the House of Lords is complex.The House of Lords consists of both hereditary peers, who have inherited their peerage and their title, and life peers, who are appointed by the government, and stay in their positions for life. A large majority of the peers are life peers. Also, important members of the clergy form part of the House of Lords, as do senior judges, or law lords, and other office holders, who have specific roles in the House. Only the office holders, such as the Leader of the House, are paid, the rest can only claim expenses.Members of the House of Lords cannot become MPs, or hold certain other elected posts. However, lords are allowed to disclaim their title and when standing to become MP, for example, and reclaim the title later. They cannot be expelled from the House of Lords by being voted out, so have less need for the support of a party, although peers may feel some loyalty to one party.At the time of writing, the government is reforming the House of Lords, and has appointed so called people's peers, who are not chosen for their affiliation to any political party, but are, in theory, appointed on merit, by an independent committee. This has not met with much success, as the people chosen were not ordinary members of the public. Hereditary peers, excluding those without a Writ of Summons and those on leave of absence, command a clear absolute majority in the present House of Lords. But the nominal membership of the House of Lords is misleading. It is perhaps not widely understood that membership of the House of Lords is not a salaried job. Peers may claim only reimbursement of expenses incurred in undertaking Parliamentary duties. Many members of the House attend only rarely. Nearly 200 hereditary peers never attended at all, not counting those on leave of absence. The majority of the business of the House is carried out by peers who regularly attend the House, the majority of whom are life peers. The only groups with a direct and legally guaranteed representation in the House of Lords are the Church of England and the Law and there are special constitutional reasons for both these. The landed interest, for historic reasons, is obviously strongly represented among hereditary peers. Some peers take seriously their local and regional roots. Others of the life peers know that they have been appointed because of work on behalf of groups to which they belong or in whose interests they have been active. But it is up to individual peers, once members of the House of Lords, to decide what interests they will promote. Bishops have always been members of the House of Lords. Originally they were summoned in their dual role as major landowners and as the king’s counsellors. In more modern times, the presence of the Bishops became increasingly associated with the establishment of the Church of England, although in law the two are quite separate. The Bishops and Archbishops now sit by virtue of the Bishoprics Act of 1878, which provides for the two Archbishops, the Bishops of London, Winchester and Durham, and the next 21 most senior diocesan Bishops to have a seat in the House of Lords. The position of the House of Lords as the supreme court of the realm also comes from the House's origins as the King’s Council. Until 1876, the judicial functions of the Lords had to be provided by those who happened to be members of it, or hereditary peerages had to be conferred to bring suitably qualified men into the House. At that point, concern about the lack of available expertise led to the innovation of conferring life peerages specifically for judicial work in the Lords, so that those who did not feel they had the resources to maintain the estate and dignity of a peerage through future generations could still be appointed. The Lord Speaker is a role elected internally by Members of the House of Lords. Politically impartial, responsibilities of the Lord Speaker include chairing the Lords debating chamber, offering advice on procedure, and acting as an ambassador for the work of the Lords both at home and abroad. The current Lord Speaker is Baroness Hayman. Responsibilities of the Lord Speaker are chairing daily business in the House of Lords debating chamber.Offering advice on procedure (the formal and informal rules of the Lords' everyday activities).Formal responsibility for security in the Lords area of the Parliamentary estate,speaking for the House on ceremonial occasions and acting as an ambassador for the work of the Lords both at home and abroad. The Speakership of the House of Lords has traditionally been performed by the Lord Chancellor. The position of Lord Chancellor can be traced back to medieval times and is one of the most senior roles in British government, bestowing membership of the cabinet and the Privy Council upon its holder. The Lord Chancellor’s powers as Speaker have been very limited compared with the Speaker of the House of Commons, since the Lords themselves control the proceedings under the guidance of the Leader of the House. Lord's business is expected to be conducted in an orderly and polite fashion without the need for an active Speaker. The Lord Chancellor sits on a special seat called the Woolsack except when the House is in Committee, but does not call upon members to speak and has no power to call the House to order. The government is now intent on a separation of these powers and on the abolition of the office of Lord Chancellor.The Since the first Lord Speaker was elected on 4 July 2006, the Lord Chancellor no longer presides over proceedings in the House of Lords. But the role has not disappeared - it has merely been amalgamated with that of secretary of state for justice. Life peers are those whose title is limited to the lifetime of the title - holder.They fall into two categories:those created under the 1876 Appellate Jurisdiction Act and those created under the 1958 Life Peerages Act. The former Act provided for a imited number of Lords of Appeal in Ordinary(Law Lords)who are appointed to hear and determine judicial appeals.The general category of Law also includes those other peers who have held or are currently holding high judicial office in a superior Court - for example ,present and former Lords Cheancellor.The 1958 Life Peerages Act enabled distinguished men and women from many walks of life to have peerages conferred on them in recognition of their political or public services to the nation.Such Life Peers may be former civil servants or diplomats;distinguished soldiers,sailors or airmen who rose to the highest military ranks,successful industrialists or prominent trade union leaders, distinguished scientists or other academics;renowned actors or other leading figures frim the world of the arts and the media . CHAPTER II WORK AND ROLE OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS For many years there has been opposition to the continued existence of the House of Lords as the second chamber in our present bicameral parliamentary system. Nevertheless the fact remains that a second chamber is needed to assist in the legislative process and the House of Lords performs the functions of a second chamber extremely well. However, despite the success of the House of Lords in performing its functions it can be argued that the House is nevertheless restricted by its aristocratic and unrepresentative composition from exercising its powers effectively. In a democracy, it may be argued all legislators should be directly accountable to the people at elections or at least accountable indirectly, for example, by election by the House of Commons. Their Lordships, however, take their seats in the legislature either because they are hereditary peers or because they have been created life peers under the Life Peerages Act 1958. The former are criticised on the grounds that high office should be awarded to those who earn it on merit and not by accident of birth, and as most hereditary peers are Conservative this leads to a permanent Conservative majority in the House. The life peers are criticised because of the considerable powers of patronage left in the hands of the Prime Minister to reward party loyalists and retiring ministers with seats in the Upper Chamber. It is also thought by some that since the members of the House of Lords do not represent any body of constituents they speak for a small privileged section of the community. As Lord Birkenhead once memorably said in debate to a member who annoyed him: ‘The noble Lord represents no-one but himself – and I don’t think much of his constituency’. 2.1. The Function and the Powers of the House of Lords The major functions of the House lie in scrutinising, amending and approving law-making proposals which have been passed by the House of Commons. Bills may also start their legislative passage in the Lords, a useful device for relieving time in the hard-pressed Commons. The powers of the Lords are limited by the Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949. These Acts provide that in relation to money bills (those bills solely concerned with finance), the House of Lords must approve the bills within one month. In relation to other bills, which are the vast majority, the Lords may delay a bill for up to twelve months over two parliamentary sessions, suggesting and negotiating amendments to the bill. After this period, if the Lords has rejected a bill twice, or amended it in a manner unsatisfactory to the Commons (which amounts to the same thing), the government may employ the Parliament Acts to overcome House of Lords’ opposition and go straight for the Royal Assent, which is the final requirement for making a bill an Act of Parliament The actual and potential conflicts between the two Houses in the legislative process should not be overemphasized. While the Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949 set out rules under which the House of Commons may – in the face of sustained opposition in the Lords – present a bill for the Royal Assent without the Lords’ consent, the Acts are rarely used. The reason for this lies in the various constitutional conventions and practices which regulate relations between the two Houses, which together reduce the need to resort to the law. The House of Lords provides a useful forum for debating the great issues of the day. Less controlled by the party whip system than the Commons, there is greater individual freedom in the Lords than the Commons. This freedom is also enhanced by the fact that the Lords are unelected, whether hereditary or appointed, and do not continue to hold their seats at the mercy of government. Once appointed, the Member’s position is secure. In the Commons, the time on the floor of the House is largely controlled by the government of the day, and dominated by the government’s need to get its legislative programme through Parliament within the annual session. In the Lords, however, time, while still restricted by legislative scrutiny, is less dictated by government need than by the Lords’ perception of matters of public interest which require debate. Government may find a particular issue morally sensitive or best avoided because of the political consequences. The Lords, not being politically accountable to an electorate, have no such qualms: ‘unpopular’ issues (unpopular with government, that is) or controversial matters such as euthanasia, abortion, embryo experimentation, poverty and welfare, housing and employment may get a better airing in the Lords than the Commons. The House of Lords also plays’ a role in the scrutiny of government, and in the scrutiny of European legislation and delegated legislation. The House of Lords is the second or ‘Upper’ House. Unelected (as yet) and unaccountable, the Upper House is able to contribute to public debate and to subject legislation to an independent and often expert form of scrutiny. The 1968 Government White Paper House of Lords Reform referred to seven functions of the House of Lords. 2.2. Its Appellate Role as the Supreme Court of Appeal Historically, the House of Lords held several judicial functions. Most notably, until 2009 the House of Lords served as the court of last resort for most instances of UK law.Since 1 October 2009 this role is now held by the newly created Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. The Lords’ erstwhile judicial functions originated from the ancient role of the Curia Regis as a body that addressed the petitions of the King’s subjects.The functions were exercised not by the whole House, but by a committee of ‘Law Lords’. The bulk of the House of Lord’s judicial business was conducted by the twelve 'Lords of Appeal in Ordinary', who were specifically appointed for this purpose under the Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876. The judicial functions could also be exercised by Lords of Appeal (other members of the House who happened to have held high judicial office). No Lord of Appeal in Ordinary or Lord of Appeal could sit judicially beyond the age of seventy-five. The judicial business of the Lords was supervised by the Senior Lord of Appeal in Ordinary and his deputy, the Second Senior Lord of Appeal in Ordinary. The jurisdiction of the House of Lords extended, in civil and criminal cases, to appeals from the courts of England and Wales, and Northern Ireland. From Scotland, appeals were possible only in civil cases; Scotland’s High Court of Justiciary is the highest court in criminal matters there. The House of Lords was not the United Kingdom’s only court of last resort; in some cases, the Privy Council also performed this function. The jurisdiction of the Privy Council in the United Kingdom, however, was relatively restricted; it encompassed appeals from ecclesiastical courts, disputes under the House of Commons Disqualification Act 1975, and a few other minor matters. Issues concerning devolution were transferred from the Privy Council to the Supreme Court in 2009. The House of Lords acts as the final court of appeal for the whole of the United Kingdom in civil cases and for England, Wales and Northern Ireland in criminal cases. If the House were abolished therefore a new ‘supreme’ court would have to be established to take its place, unless of course the Court of Appeal were to become the final appeal court for England and Wales. However, as the judicial work of the House is separate from its other functions and only involves the judicial Committee – drawn from the Lord High Chancellor, the Lords of Appeal in Ordinary and Lords who hold or have held high judicial office – the separation of the judicial Committee from the rest of the House of Lords or its replacement by some new body would not perhaps cause too great a constitutional problem.The Constitutional Reform Act 2005 resulted in the creation of a separate Supreme Court of the United Kingdom, to which the judicial function of the House of Lords, and some of the judicial functions of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, have now been transferred. In addition, the office of Lord Chancellor was reformed by the 2005 Act, removing his power to act as both a government minister and a judge. This was motivated, in part, by concerns that the historical admixture of legislative, judicial and executive powers might not satisfy the requirements of the European Convention on Human Rights in connection with a judiciary's impartiality. It was also a response to growing acceptance of the view promoted by modern constitutional theorists that the old approach gave rise to very real separation of powers concerns. The new Supreme Court is located at Middlesex Guildhall in London. 2.3. The Provision of a Forum for Free Debate and Matters of Public Interest Secondly, the House provides a forum for free debate on matters of public interest, Wednesday in particular being traditionally set aside for special debate on a wide range of subjects. Apart from the fact that these debates are usually of a very high standard; a standard that would perhaps never be reached in the Commons, even if the time were available, this loss would not pose any great constitutional problem. Debates may be initiated either by the government, opposition, backbench or independent members. Once a month, from the beginning of the Session until the Spring Bank Holiday recess, there are two ‘Short Debates’, limited to two and a half hours each. The right to initiate such debates is confined to backbenchers and crossbenchers and the subjects for debate are chosen by ballot. 2.4. The Revision of Public Bills Bought from the House of Commons Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, the House acts as a revising chamber for Public Bills brought from the House of Commons. About one half of the time of the House of Lords is devoted to the consideration of Public Bills. The majority of this time is spent on revising Bills which have already passed the Commons, where the great majority of government legislation is introduced. The House of Commons does not have the time to fully debate all the legislation it has to pass each session and the use of procedures for the curtailment of debate, such as the guillotine, often means that Bills are passed by the Commons without really being considered at all. A second chamber is therefore required to examine and revise such Bills. If the second chamber is abolished then the procedures of the House of Commons for enacting legislation will have to be changed if the present standard and volume of legislation is to be maintained. This could be achieved by membership of the House of Commons becoming fulltime and by making even more use of committees. However, even then the volume of legislation may still prove to be too great, necessitating either a shortening of the procedure by which a Bill is enacted or making more use of subordinate legislation, which some would argue is already over used as it is. Certainly some fundamental changes would have to be made to the proceedings of the House of Commons and these may prove unacceptable to many of the present MPs. The House of Lords serves a valuable purpose in scrutinising Bills passed by the House of Commons, with about one half of the time of the House of Lords devoted to the consideration of, Public Bills. This process is especially important because, unlike the Commons, the Lords have nothing corresponding to the guillotine and there is therefore no effective machinery for curtailing debate. Also the Lords have no provision for the selection of amendments for debate and therefore all amendments tabled may be debated. To some extent the House of Lords can compensate for inadequate scrutiny of legislation by the House of Commons. The powers of the House of Lords to prevent the wishes of the House of Commons are, of course, limited by the provisions of the Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949, under which certain Public Bills may be presented for the Royal Assent without the consent of the Lords. 2.5. The Initiation of Public Bills The House of Lords does not stand idle at the start of a parliamentary session waiting for legislation to work its way up from the House of Commons. Bills which are relatively uncontroversial in party political terms have been introduced in the House of Lords with a fair degree of regularity. These include the Wildlife and Countryside Bill (1980-81 Session), the National Heritage Bill, Data Protection Bill and the Health and Social Services and Social Security Adjudications Bill (1982-83 Session). By convention all Consolidation Bills (Bills which do not alter the law but replace a number of Acts dealing with a particular subject by a single Act) and most Bills to give effect to changes in the law proposed by the Law Commissions, are introduced in the Lords. Unlike members of the House of Commons, members of the Lords are free to introduce Private Members’ Bills into the House and there is usually sufficient time for them to be debated. However if they are passed there is no guarantee that time will be found for them in the House of Commons. The fact that the Lords have no constituents makes it easier for them to discuss measures proposing controversial changes in the law in this way. The Lords thus played a significant part in reforming the law relating to homosexuality and abortion. 2.6. The Consideration of Subordinate Legislation Their Lordships also contribute to the scrutiny of delegated legislation. The powers of the House of Lords over delegated legislation were not curtailed by the Parliament Acts and are therefore the same as those enjoyed by the House of Commons. When a resolution of each House approving the instrument is required, the House of Lords always has an opportunity to debate the instrument. In the case of negative instruments, any member may move a motion to annul the instrument and while in the Commons time often cannot be found to debate such motions, in the Lords there is no such difficulty. 2.7. The Scrutiny of the Activities of the Executive The government departments will have representatives in the House of Lords who can be questioned about policy by peers in the same way that ministers can be questioned in the House of Commons. there may not be a debate. ‘Unstarred questions’ are taken at the end of business. The Lord asking the question makes a speech, and a debate may take place before the minister makes his reply, which concludes the proceedings. Private notice questions may be asked on matters of urgency. It is for the Leader of the House or as a last resort for the House itself, to decide what constitutes a matter of urgency. The process of question time in the House of Lords therefore provides a valuable adjunct to the procedure in the House of Commons. 2.9. Changing Role of the House of Lords Calls for reform of this distinctive chamber have variously been made,especially since the expansion of the franchise in the nineteenth century, producing a first chamber able to claim legitimacy through popular election. The first half of the twentieth century saw a change in the powers of the House. The 1911 and 1949 Parliaments Acts limited the power of the House to veto bills introduced in the Commons. The second half of the century saw a change in the composition of the House.The 1958 Life Peerages Act made provision for peerages that became extinct on the death of the holder. Life peers soon became a significant presence in the second chamber. The 1963 Peerages Act enabled hereditary peers to renounce their titles. Reform of the House of Lords has provoked intense debate and policy initiatives for over 100 years. In 1999, the Government enacted a significant, and overdue, reform by removing the right of the majority of the hereditary peers to sit and vote. As a result of this reform, a more assertive and effective House of Lords has emerged.The reform has improved the scrutiny of Government and in so doing, has improved British democracy overall. However, reform of the House of Lords remains unfinished business. There are still 92 hereditarypeers sitting in the Lords. House of Lords reform has been talked about for over a century, but the subject has been of most recent attention as, in 1999, Tony Blair’s New Labour Party introduced a reform for the Upper Chamber to make it more representative and democratic. But the government only conducted the first stage of this reform, consisting in a merely partial abolition of the hereditary peers. Since then, the composition of the House of Lords is only temporary while proposals for a second reform stage are being discussed for five years now. The two dimensions to reform of the House of Lords are, firstly, altering its power and, secondly, reforming its composition and the method of its members’ selection. The Lords’ power comes from its ability to delay bills and force reconsideration in the Commons, set out in the 1911 and 1949 Parliament Acts. Limiting the Lords’ power would probably mean another amendment to the Parliament Acts. Moreover, the Lords have acted well as a balance to the Commons since 1949 and continue to do so, as partly demonstrated above by recent examples; therefore, any reform of the House’s power is not needed. However, reform of the composition of the House, and how those members are selected, is needed. There are opinions that elections would give the Lords composition democratic validity. However, there is a strong argument that an elected House would weaken, not strengthen the democratic process. An elected House would also threaten the intrinsic worth of the Lords to act as a moderating check on governments. Parliamentary balance of power would be lost. Only reform of the House’s composition and the method of selection of itsmembers is needed. Reform must not sacrifice the House of Lords’ ability to fulfil its vital role in Parliament in pursuit of total democratisation. Instead, reform should seek to enhance the representative credentials of the Upper House through a more sensible and relevant system of appointing Lords. The House of Lords has a vestigial role in legislation in the UK, it is now completely subordinate to the House of Commons. The House of Lords as an Upper Chamber has the primary purpose of scrutinising Legislation proposed by the Lower House through the form of debate and through proposing amendments to legislation. The role of the Lords different from the Commons, whose job it is to represent the public and pass bills from the Government. The Lords do not have to represent their constituents views and are under no pressure from Party Leadership. Governments in recent years have used the Upper House as a variant of the Select Committee process to finalise legislation before presentation for Royal Assent. The House of Lords debates legislation, and has some power to amend or reject bills. However, the power of the Lords to reject a bill passed by the House of Commons is severely restricted by the Parliament Acts. Under those Acts, certain types of bills may be presented for the Royal Assent without the consent of the House of Lords (i.e. the Commons can override the Lords’ veto). The House of Lords cannot delay a money bill (a bill that, in the view of the Speaker of the House of Commons, solely concerns national taxation or public funds) for more than one month. Other public bills cannot be delayed by the House of Lords for more than two parliamentary sessions, or one calendar year. These provisions, however, only apply to public bills that originate in the House of Commons, and cannot have the effect of extending a parliamentary term beyond five years. A further restriction is a constitutional convention known as the Salisbury Convention, which means that the House of Lords does not oppose legislation promised in the Government's election manifesto. There is a constitutional convention that the House of Lords should not spend more than 60 days over bills sent to them by the Commons. By a custom that prevailed even before the Parliament Acts, the House of Lords is further restrained insofar as financial bills are concerned. The House of Lords may neither originate a bill concerning taxation or Supply (supply of treasury or exchequer funds), nor amend a bill so as to insert a taxation or Supply-related provision. (The House of Commons, however, often waives its privileges and allows the Upper House to make amendments with financial implications.) Moreover, the Upper House may not amend any Supply Bill. The House of Lords formerly maintained the absolute power to reject a bill relating to revenue or Supply, but this power was curtailed by the Parliament Acts. Historically, the House of Lords held several judicial functions. The Lords' judicial functions originated from the ancient role of the Curia Regis as a body that addressed the petitions of the King's subjects. The functions were exercised not by the whole House, but by a committee of "Law Lords". The Lords is not a static institution. Like other key British institutions, it has changed and evolved through its history, and will continue to do so. This has never been more evident than in the last century, which saw major changes to the Lords – from the Parliament. Lords check the work of the Government by questioning and debating decisions made by ministers and government departments. Legislative scrutiny will continue to be an important purpose of a reformed second chamber. The present House of Lords has the power explicitly to ask the Government and the House of Commons to look again at legislation and to delay its enactment. The Government accepts that power of this sort is a proper function of a second chamber. In the United Kingdom, the two Houses of Parliament have evolved in such a way that the House of Lords shares some of the functions of the House of Commons but has no separate tasks apart from its judicial work. In the law-making process for example, the House of Lords can discuss and revise bills that come from the House of Commons. In other words, the Lords mostly does the same as it has done for the last hundred years, which is to act as a restraint on the power of the Government to legislate. CONCLUSION The House of Lords, as it exists today, is thus the product of a long evolutionary process. The House of Lords has a number of functions within Parliament considering and amending legislation, questioning the Government through debates and questions to Ministers, debating matters of public interest and carrying out specialist investigations through select committees of the House. We can easily say that, the House of Lords has four objectives in its legislative scrutiny work . It tries to increase the transparency of the reasoning supporting the proposed legislation. It can stimulate the Department to give further consideration to matters which give rise to concern. Involving civil society in its work strengthens the element of participatory (or at least consultative) democracy in the legislative process. The legislative powers of the House of Lords will remain unaltered. These are all important jobs for a second chamber, and the increasing volume and complexity of Government work and Government legislation means that both the workload of the House of Lords is increasing and its contribution to the legislative process is greater. The Upper House must complement the strengths and weaknesses of the Commons. The elected Commons represents the political nation, and is therefore necessarily supreme; it must have the final say to preserve core accountability. The Upper House must enhance the work of the Lower House and provide a differing point of view. The role of the Lords differs from the Commons, whose job it is to represent the public and pass bills from the Government. The Lords do not have to represent their constituents views and are under no pressure from Party Leadership. The Lords is also a debating chamber and some extent the House of Lords can reward for deficient scrutiny of legislation by the House of Commons. Though the powers of the Lords are limited by 1911 and 1949 Acts but the fact is that the House of Lords exercise the functions of a second chamber very well. The second chamber is needed to assist in the legislative process, it works to revise legislation ensuring it is coherent and legislative scrutiny will continue to be an important purpose of a reformed second chamber.