Peerlessness

After the Forfeiture Committee made their decision on Mr Goodwin - as I insisted a few days ago - maybe this previously little known Civil Service and Cabinet Office process could now be used to deal with Parliament's redundant second chamber once and for all.

"Mr" Goodwin

With IDS's benefits bill being driven through without listening to the Lords and other legislation in the past being authorised by the Commons via the Parliament Act of 1997 without their Lordships' now pointless assents, it really is time for this anachronism to call it a day. The Forfeiture Committee was only supposed to consider removing titles and honours from recipients that had had the misfortune to have been imprisoned for a period greater than three months as a result of a criminal act or had been struck off from a professional body related to the occupation for which the honour was originally bestowed. But now a precedent has been set. Goodwin had his knighthood taken away as a result of his being incompetent (in the field for which he had received his honour - banking) and although many believe he should have been imprisoned or struck off from something (or struck with something, perhaps), he wasn't. He wasn't even found to be "incompetent" in the FSA report on RBS...just "cold" and "calculating". He was, for the most part, just found wanting in the court of public opinion and became a scapegoat for politicians.

Very 21st Century...?

So, all that has to be done now is the placing of a microscope over the Upper House in order that their Lordships can be scrutinised in such a way as to make the public and the Commons find it impossible to justify any other action but to demand forfeiture of title. The Forfeiture Committee can only deal with individuals so, regrettably, there will have to be over eight hundred cases to be submitted to Her Maj.

Yes! Eight-bleeding-hundred of them - that's almost 25% more than there are MPs - and they come in four classic styles:

a) Lords Spiritual. These are bishops, and there are 26 of them

b) Lords Temporal. These are not bishops and there are 672 of these, all given peerages on the recommendation of successive Prime Ministers.

c) Hereditary Peers. These aren't bishops, either, and are a different type of Lord Temporal and number 90 privileged toffs

d) Peers on "Leave of Absence" (which recently, in the case of Lord Taylor of Warwick, meant "in prison") and there are about 20 of these.

To make life easier for the Forfeiture Committee it would be sensible to come up with reasons for foretiture of title in each of the four categories rather than on an individual basis, otherwise this will take far too long.

More tea, Vicar?

The first category is simple. The Lords Spiritual are all Anglican bishops. Around about 1.7 million people attend anglican services on a regular basis. That's about three per cent of the population and falling rapidly. Not good enough, is it? Smacks of incompetence, really, to be losing market share like that. This doesn't happen in Islam. They have a more or less 100% take up. On the Goodwin Scale of messing up in your profession, the bishops are at least an '8'. (The Goodwin Scale ranges from: 1 = Contributing absolutely nothing to society or to The Treasury through to 10 = Costing The Treasury in excess of 5% of GDP and pissing off at least 80% of the population. (The cost element of the scale is sigmoidally curvy). The bishops piss off about 90% of the population but, to be fair, they don't cost an awful lot as they are mostly self-funded but that does include income from vast tracts of land and thousands of properties that, arguably, should belong to the state. Anyway, any score above a '6' on the Goodwin Scale has to result in automatic forfieture of title, so off go the first 26. This will also help a great deal in easing in the much needed legislation on the separation of church and state through secularisation.

The twenty or so peers on leave of absence will piss off at least 99.9999997% of the population (i.e. everyone except themselves, as they're just not doing what they are required to do by dint of their honour. So that's those done away with.

The bulk of the Lords Temporal can also be deemed not to be doing their jobs because the Commons can, as mentioned above, enact legislation without them. This makes their adminstration costs, premises costs, attendance allowances and other remuneration a complete waste of money. On the Goodwin Scale curve of cost to the economy, this is a solid '7', bordering on an '8' so even if less than 80% of the population aren't pissed off (just midly annoyed, say), then that'll do it for another 672.

The final group is the trickiest as hereditary titles, however wrong they are, do not come under the remit of the Forfeiture Committee. The Acts of Parliament that changed the House of Lords allowed for ninety hereditary peers to remain but their successors to their titles will not take up the seats. That means we could wait for all of them to die but realistically that could be another fifty or sixty years and in that period, the House of Lords would subsist and, worse still, as a result of having got rid of the others, would be populated solely be a bunch of privileged arseholes falling asleep on their red leather and just getting in the way. And there isn't a minimum quorum in the Lords. Additional legislation will take too long and the hereditary peers, although falling into the category of the Lords Temporal, could legitimately argue their right to remain despite being within the Goodwin Scale parameters for forfeiture. No, the thing to do is to make the House of Lords so unattractive as to make them go of their own accord. Give them more work to do! With only ninety left, the work previously allocated to eight hundred will mean that the remaining few will be unable to cope and the impact on their lives will become intolerable, especially if the majority of that work is allocated from 12th August annually for three months or so. It should only take a couple of years before they're all screaming to sign the new amendments to the Parliament Act to release them from the burden of public service and the Upper House will be no more.

No! No! NO! This can't be right....

There is, however, a major problem in amongst all of this. Under the constitutional laws around "de-peering", the Forfeiture Committee can only recommend action and, just like all Acts of Parliament too, Royal Assent is required. So, Her Maj will have to agree to every Lord, whether Spiritual or Temporal (but not hereditary) being stripped of his or her title. OK, in the cases of Taylor of Warwick, Two-Jags Prescott and possibly the odious story-teller, Archer, she might sign without demur but as for doing for the rest of them...? Maybe I'm worrying unduly. The non-hereditary Lords Temporal are all political appointments and what with the Royal Family believing that they are there by right and privilege and not at the whim of transient politicians, she might be attracted to the idea of these 'commoners' being returned to their deserved common status. But, as head of the Church of England, she may not feel so gung-ho with her fountain pen where the Lords Spiritual are concerned. However, she assented to Goodwin's forfeiture so, on that basis, she has to agree with Goodwin Scale. And besides, if Rowan Williams, John Sentamu and the rest don't have to bother with parliamentary crap any more then they'll have more time for the anglican pastoral work that I imagine Her Maj might rather they get on with before mosque attendance volume outstrips that of the Church of England.

Next Steps:

1) A forfeiture system for members of the Royal Family

2) A forfeiture system for MPs

3) Independence for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and...

4) The appointment of Ken Livingstone as "Mayor of All England"

Job done...and off we all can "Trot".

He's the Man...