"Gordon Brown's report on the future of the UK earlier this week was 155 pages long and contained 40 detailed recommendations on everything from relations with the devolved governments in Scotland and Wales, to moving civil servants out of Whitehall and creating employment "clusters" around the country.
However, all most voters are likely to have remembered from it is that Labour will abolish the unelected House of Lords. And yet this is probably the proposal least likely to be implemented of all of Brown's many ideas. Keir Starmer dutifully echoed the former prime minister's judgement that Westminster's second chamber is "indefensible" in its current form, and indicated it was something he'd like to do something about.
But he was careful not to commit definitively to abolition in Labour's first term, saying only that it is an idea "capable" of being implemented within that timescale, as he sent the Brown report off for consultation. And it was not long before Labour grandees began mounting a rearguard action against ditching the Upper House, with Lord Mandelson warning that abolition would not be "painless or simple" while Lord Blunkett pointed to the "gridlock" that so often gums up a US Congress made up of two elected chambers.
This story is from the December 09, 2022 edition of The Independent.
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This story is from the December 09, 2022 edition of The Independent.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
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