RESTRICTION ON VETO

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26616, 12 November 1947, Page 5

RESTRICTION ON VETO

HOUSE OF LORDS’ POWER

DESIGNED FOR PROGRESSIVE GOVERNMENTS

LONDON, Nov. 10.

Moving in the House of Commons the second, reading of the Bill to restrict the House of Lords’ power of veto on legislation to one year instead of two, Mr Herbert Morrison said the Government’s programme as approved by the electorate could not in these times be achieved in two, or sometimes even three, years. A Conservative Government had no trouble with the House of Lords, but a progressive Government had. The 1911 Act was too generous to the Lords. “The Opposition’s conception of freedom means there shall be freedom for the interests behind the Conservatives,” Mr Morrison said. He was not convinced the House of Lords was qualified to interpret the people’s will. Such interpretation, in any case, could not possibly be accepted. The Government proposed a reasonable alteration to the Parliament Act, necessary to enable the present and future progressive Governments to carry on

effectively. The present constitution of the House of Lords virtually raised the Opposition to a position superior to that of the Government, “ but they are not going to get their way. We are not going to tolerate that situation,” he said. Mr Morrison said if the House of Lords rejected the present Bill, it could not be passed finally into law until December, 1949. .“ If we are forced to use the Parliament Act procedure, a rearrangement of the normal sessions may be required to secure the statutory three sessions before the Bill can receive the Royal Assent,” Mr Morrison said. He added that the Government appreciated some of the Lords’ improvements to the Government’s legislatioh, but it had no guarantee that matters would remain as at present. Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe (Con.), denying that the Government had a mandate for the Bill,' said the important political function of the second chamber generally was the power of delay. The present Bill gave effective power of delay of under six months, which was not sufficient for an adequate ex-

pression of the nation’s opinion.

The remedy was not to tinker with the Lords’ powers, but to deal with its composition. Reform should not be introduced through a highly-'contro-versial measure, which, according to all accounts, had led to the sharpest differences of opinion within the Cabinet and it should not be attempted in the nation’s present condition.

He moved the Conservatives’ amendment for rejection of the Bill, the text of which is that the House of Commons refuses a second reading to the Bill, which, without mandate, justification. or public demand, seeks to destroy the constitutional safeguards of the Parliament Act. 1911, when no complaint was made of the use by the House of Lords of its existing powers, when no attempt was made to deal with the composition of the Second Chamber, which the Act laid down as an essential condition of further reform, and when 'the immediate consequence can be only to distract attention from the country’s economic perils.