The SNP has today [Tuesday] called for the unelected, undemocratic House of Lords to be scrapped. The move comes on the back of reports that David Cameron is to press ahead with the appointment of around 200 new peers, bringing the total to over 1000.<\/p>\n
Commenting, SNP Shadow Leader of the House of Commons Pete Wishart MP said:<\/p>\n
\u201cThe House of Lords has never been held in such contempt by the Scottish people who see it as nothing other than a repository for the cronies and donors of the UK parties. With its Lords, Ladies, Baronets and Earls\u00a0it can only be described as the most absurd and ridiculous legislature anywhere in the world. Even though it currently dwarves the elected chamber, David Cameron, seems hell-bent on increasing this bizarre bloated institution even further, stuffing it even more full of Tory\u00a0placemen\u00a0and donors.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe public are rightly concerned about the increasing costs of the Parliament, and the Government is currently considering reducing the number of elected members in the course of this Parliament. There can therefore be no reason for increasing the unelected Lords to some 1,000 members.<\/p>\n
\u201cInstead,\u00a0what we should be looking at is the abolition of the whole chamber and the creation of a fit-for-purpose 21st century democratic House free of 17th century forelock tugging and deference. The current House of Lords is beyond reform and it must now be cleared out and reconstituted on firm democratic principles.<\/p>\n
\u201cAn unelected chamber has no place in a modern society and House of Lords reform has been promised by generations of UK political leaders. The public are growing angrier by the day by the antics of those who inhabit this gold plated, red-upholstered Narnia. As the cost of sustaining all these Lords and Baronenesses continues to grow \u2013 Scottish Lords alone cost the taxpayer over \u00a32million a year \u2013 Scottish families are increasingly relying on\u00a0food banks\u00a0in austerity ridden Tory UK.<\/p>\n
\u201cAction is needed and it is needed now. The House of Lords is a relic that can no longer be afforded in a modern democracy and it is now time for it to go.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The SNP has today [Tuesday] called for the unelected, undemocratic House of Lords to be scrapped. The move comes on the back of reports that David Cameron is to press ahead with the appointment of around 200 new peers, bringing the total to over 1000. Commenting, SNP Shadow Leader of the House of Commons Pete Wishart MP said: \u201cThe House of Lords has never been held in such contempt by the Scottish people who see it as nothing other than a repository for the cronies and donors of the UK parties. With its Lords, Ladies, Baronets and Earls\u00a0it can only be described as the mostRead More →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[86,66],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/862"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=862"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/862\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":863,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/862\/revisions\/863"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=862"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=862"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=862"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}