‘Rewards for failure’ – Liz Truss resignation honours to create new peers while Tories oppose expanded Senedd
Plans for Liz Truss to be given the power to create new House of Lords peers as part of her “resignation honours” – while Conservatives continue to oppose expanding the Senedd – have been criticised as “rewards for failure”.
The new batch of peers will come on top of Boris Johnson’s resignation honours, and the 25 new Lords announced by the UK Government last month.
It means that tens of new peers will be added to the swelling ranks of the House of Lords which already has around 800 sitting members.
Meanwhile, plans included in the Welsh Government co-operation agreement with Plaid Cymru to add just 36 new members to the Senedd – bringing the total to 96 – are opposed by the Conservative Party.
Responding to the news that Liz Truss would be able to create new peers as part of her resignation honours, despite only serving for 44 days, the Electoral Reform Society said they amounted to “rewards for failure”.
Willie Sullivan, Senior Director at the Electoral Reform Society, said: “A seat in the House of Lords should not be a reward for failure. It’s a lifetime appointment to make our laws, not a gift to be handed out by a prime minister as they head out the door.
“If Liz Truss chooses to pack the Lords with new peers on leaving office, it will only further damage Westminster’s legitimacy at a time when public faith in politics is already stretched to the limit.
“We’re still waiting for Boris Johnson’s resignation honours to be announced, with a second Truss list added to the pile we could be seeing a bumper batch of appointments filling the already bloated house even more ex-MPs, donors and political allies.
“We need a smaller, elected House of Lords, where lawmakers are chosen by the people they serve not hand-picked by the prime minister of the day. It’s time to end this farce and deliver the democratic second chamber our country needs.”
‘Referendum’
Welsh Conservative leader Andrew RT Davies has repeatedly criticised the idea of more Senedd Members, saying last month: “Putting 36 more Senedd Members in Cardiff Bay would cost us £100 million in the first five years alone. Let’s fund our NHS instead.”
The UK Government have also previously called for a referendum on expanding the Senedd.
First Minister Mark Drakeford has already accused the Conservatives of complaining about the expansion of the Senedd on one hand while increasing the number of peers in the House of Lords on the other.
Earlier this year he asked: “Every nine months, the Prime Minister appoints more people to the House of Lords than we propose adding to the membership of the Senedd—every nine months.
“Where’s the referendum on that, I wonder?”
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Democracy, is this what it looks like, and the English press and establishment pour scorn on Putin when he tilts the game in his favour in a dictatorship that pretends to be a democracy. That is what we have, a pretend democracy, and the Tory party in Cymru spew vitriolic rhetoric about the Senedd, because they are unable to con the electorate here. How to spot a snake oil salesman, he will turn up on the doorstep with a Tory manifesto.
If Truss gets her honours list then when Boris is PM again and finally gets thrown out for corruption it is only fair he gets a second honours list and an additional £115,000 a year.
Just when you think the UK has sank to the bottom, they then sink further.
Wales should vote to get out of this corrupt union.
The European Union unlike the UK is democratic voluntary union of consenting independent nations in Europe.
My God!! Have the tories no shame? They make up rules when it suits them, lie, break the law, U-turn on everything, break promises, no loyalty to the nation and engage in anything else that is fraudulent and corrupt. The whole lot of them need to go now!! It’s like a Brian Rix farce only it’s not funny. They all need to be charged for crimes against the nation and total failure of duty and sent for trial in the Supreme Court. But, I suppose, the government have the lawyers and judges in the palm of their hands.
800+ on £800pw all unelected. This along with two PMs unelected by the public this year – what a joke our democracy is these days.
I thought they were paid £320 per day.
Members of the House of Lords are not salaried. They can opt to receive a £323 per day attendance allowance, plus travel expenses and subsidised restaurant facilities. Peers may also choose to receive a reduced attendance allowance of £162 per day instead.
Creaduriaid bach .bum yn byw yn gynnil gynnil
Must be tough making ends meet on that sort of gravy. JRM probably calls it “thin gruel”. No wonder the s.o.b’s have pensions or fees from elsewhere to top up their meagre drawings. No wonder so many lightweight politicians of all colours queue to take the ermine.
Ah, sorry, that’s alright then….
Rewards for failure. Mmm. I drive trucks for a living. I turn up, get in the truck, hook up to a trailer and deliver the load. Simple. However, now I’m considering turning up, getting in the truck for five minutes which is enough time to put my tachograph card in to show I was there then take it out again and go home. For this I expect the minimum days’ pay of 8 hours plus any overtime I would have had depending on how far I would have been travelling that day. Ridiculous notion you say? Yes but that is… Read more »
Right on! It just shows that we all need to co-operate to ensure that in every seat where the Tories won thanks to a split non-Tory vote that we only field one non-Tory candidate. If we can get them out we can persuade whoever leads the resulting co-alition that electoral reform and constitutional reform are high priority items to restore the World’s confidence in the UK as a law abiding rational country. A good piece on this in the Observer today by Will Hutton. Nice to see some optimism amongst all the gloom.