The archaism of Britain’s upper parliamentary chamber is not the cause of Sir Keir Starmer’s current political woes, but it is a feature. Peter Mandelson’s peerage was not directly related to his appointment as ambassador to Washington, but nor was it irrelevant. He enjoyed the status bestowed by a seat in the Lords during many years of friendship with Jeffrey Epstein. Although he has voluntarily resigned from active membership of parliament, Lord Mandelson’s title can only be rescinded by special statute. That is a reminder of the absurdity in a system that empowers party leaders to dole out places in the legislature to friends and supporters, with no obligation ever to face judgment by the electorate.
Sir Keir is now under yet more pressure related to a peer. Earlier this week, Labour suspended the Lords whip from Matthew Doyle, a former Downing Street director of communications, who campaigned in council elections on behalf of a friend who had been charged with possessing indecent images of children. Lord Doyle says he had believed his friend was innocent. No 10 says he did not give a full account of the facts when the peerage was awarded.
Conservatives say the episode is another display of the prime minister’s terrible judgment in making appointments. But they do not call for wider reforms, still less a clear-out of unsuitable peers, because the Lords is stuffed with Tory donors, cronies and aides with tenuous credentials to be legislators for life.
Labour understood this issue well enough in opposition. The party’s 2024 manifesto promised an extensive process of “immediate reform” of the Lords. The last remaining hereditary peers would go. The appointments process and other accountability mechanisms would be strengthened to uphold standards. Ultimately, the whole house would be replaced with a “more representative” second chamber.
Progress on implementation has been slow. A bill to scrap hereditary peerages was introduced in the Commons in September 2024, delayed and diluted in the Lords, and has yet to receive royal assent. Other planned reforms have been referred to a committee that is not due to report until July. There is no talk of abolishing the upper house, nor even a consultation on what might replace it.
That loss of ambition was predictable. Constitutional reform is hard. Persuading a chamber of peers to accept change, let alone abolish itself, was always going to consume bandwidth that Downing Street would rather use elsewhere. It is low on most voters’ list of priorities; not “a doorstep issue”, say political strategists.
But dysfunction in Britain’s governing institutions has a way of cutting through to the public, as recent scandals have demonstrated. Trust in the political process and contempt for a system deemed to be inherently corrupt – run for the benefit of elites – is very much a doorstep issue. Avoiding constitutional reform on the basis that it takes up too much time for insufficient political reward is a false economy.
Sir Keir’s instincts in opposition were the right ones. The rotten apparatus of sleazy patronage and power without accountability is not peripheral to his government’s dismal ratings. It is one of the things he promised to change and that has stayed the same. He would be in a stronger position now if he had addressed the issue with reforming zeal on first entering Downing Street. It is not too late.
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