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Britain is ejecting hereditary nobles from Parliament after 700 years

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Re: Britain is ejecting hereditary nobles from Parliament after 700 years

#331

Post by JCattheATM »

t43562 wrote: post #323
JCattheATM wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> gradually evolving them into a modern liberal democracy. And yet, they are still not quite there. There is something to be said for design over stumbling.

The stumbling is natural - it's a sort of stable thing deriving out of the state of now. Design is something put out there which may not stand up to the test of how people actually behave i.e. it may not be stable.

It's fine to stumble initially, like discovering fire, but design gets us lighters and ovens. Good design allows for some flexibility without leaving everything to chance like pure stumbling does.

Re: Britain is ejecting hereditary nobles from Parliament after 700 years

#332

Post by JCattheATM »

hunterpayne wrote: post #246
JCattheATM wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The power of a constitution is in it being the highest law in the land, that legislation can't just override. It's only recently in the US that there is a blatantly corrupt kakistocracy who feels free to ignore it.

Counterpoint, the recent ruling on the Tariffs.

Too late and too weak a response.

Re: Britain is ejecting hereditary nobles from Parliament after 700 years

#333

Post by JCattheATM »

InvertedRhodium wrote: post #239
JCattheATM wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> many of those appointed to Life Peerages meet the goal of having significant life experience This is a poor justification for what still amounts to an unelected ruling class.

Honestly, I look around the world and don’t see much, if any, practical difference. The US has had two presidents that were direct relatives, I can’t believe that’s by pure chance or some kind of genetic skill at being president.

It's because people find comfort in what they know, nothing more complicated than that.

Re: Britain is ejecting hereditary nobles from Parliament after 700 years

#334

Post by hardlianotion »

scott_w wrote: post #308
hardlianotion wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which manifesto commitments have been blocked in this parliament?

> Which manifesto commitments have been blocked in this parliament? To be clear, I didn't say they "blocked," I said: > though the Lords recently have been playing silly buggers around the Employment Rights Act This was a manifesto commitment which, while it eventually went through, it was touch and go for a little bit. Reporting at the time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f412kJChC6g

Okay, though to be fair to me, you said just after

> and ignoring the Salisbury Convention (which is that they shouldn’t block manifesto commitments)

which is what attracted my question.

Thanks for the link. I haven’t watched it, but I will observe that a lot of the modern legislation that comes out of the commons should properly attract the attention of the Lords, as it doesn’t get nearly enough attention from the commons.

Re: Britain is ejecting hereditary nobles from Parliament after 700 years

#335

Post by WickyNilliams »

w0de0 wrote: post #297

Genuinely regrettable. The appointed life peers system is worse than the traditional ‘hereditary sortition’ (if you will). The former creates a class of semi-sinecures of equally questionable quality yet beholden to the political system of the moment. Life peerages become awards for donors and loyalists, a legitimized corruption. The house’s composition becomes an ever-growing competition based on unlimited partisan…

A lifelong hereditary appointment is an affront to democracy imo. It is regrettable we have a monarchy, but their power is very limited. The Lords however have a regular say in the production of laws. A second house is good. But hereditary appointment is only one degree removed from some divine right.

But I entirely agree about political appointments. You only have to look at the last set from the Tories/Boris to see that the system has been abused.

Re: Britain is ejecting hereditary nobles from Parliament after 700 years

#336

Post by SoftTalker »

krapp wrote: post #314
SoftTalker wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the American system as originally founded, most of these things were intended to be decided by the states.

In the American system as originally founded, black people were property. It should be expected that the American system is not eternally bound to the will and scope of vision of the founding fathers, that it can and should evolve over time as the needs and nature of society evolves. Otherwise, it isn't a republic, it's a cult.

Yes, that was corrected by using the amendment process (and fighting a huge war) a long time ago. The system was designed to allow for correction.

Re: Britain is ejecting hereditary nobles from Parliament after 700 years

#337

Post by WickyNilliams »

glaucon wrote: post #206

If you're not British please don't assume that "ejecting heriditary nobles" from the upper house of parliament is automatically going to increase the quality of governance. For more than a century the majority of those who sit in the House of Lords have been "Life Peers", appointed by a politician and without any heriditary aspect. They include such towers of statepersonship as : Evgeny Lebedev (Russian businessman,…

This is more an argument against political appointees than it is an argument for hereditary peers. I agree that the system has been abused. It's need reforming

Re: Britain is ejecting hereditary nobles from Parliament after 700 years

#338

Post by nephihaha »

throw_rust wrote: post #8

From hereditary buffoons to patronage pissoir and party hack retirement home, not much better off methinks.

The hereditary buffoons were more independent-minded, and sometimes progressive, than the appointees.

Not a fan of the old system but this is not an improvement.

Re: Britain is ejecting hereditary nobles from Parliament after 700 years

#339

Post by nephihaha »

Nursie wrote: post #226
jongjong wrote: post #47

This is a dark day for the monarchy... and for democracy in the UK. Remove the only people who actually have a long-term vested non-financial interest in the system and replace them with more revolving-door politicians backed by the big money so that the big money can operate with even less friction than before. Great. Just great. The problem with our current democratic systems with unlimited government fiat money is…

Oh piss off. It's removing the nobs from the system, people who are there by right of birth alone. There is no reason a modern democracy shoud cow-tow to such people or allow them any power over the rest of us.

Appointees are even worse. We already have MPs who are supposed to be elected but enact the same UN NGO and WEF programmes as other countries without democratic assent.

Re: Britain is ejecting hereditary nobles from Parliament after 700 years

#340

Post by cthalupa »

DougN7 wrote: post #329
endoblast wrote: post #57

When Wellington thrashed Bonaparte, As every child can tell, The House of Peers, throughout the war, Did nothing in particular, And did it very well; Yet Britain set the world ablaze In good King George's glorious days! (from Iolanthe by Gilbert and Sullivan) Gather a group of the most powerful people in the land; give them ermine robes and manifold privileges; require of them nothing other than that they meet regula…

My father-in-law always liked to see an exact number of democrats and republicans in congress, or congress held by one and the senate the other, for exactly this reason. With deadlock they can’t screw things up more. I’m not sure I disagree.

Congress has had one of the lowest approval ratings of anything in government for a long time now because it doesn't get things done. Most Americans are quite unhappy with Congressional deadlock being the norm.

It's also directly lead to the continued rise of the powers of the unitary executive - the EO that have become the norm in the 2000s are in large part because Congress has largely voided all responsibility for legislating.

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