The Spectator’s Notes | 14 July 2012

A big reason for opposing these Lords reforms is that they would threaten the power of the Commons. If the Commons passed them, however, it would deserve to be threatened. It would display — like No. 10 Downing Street — an ignorance of the constitution and an arrogance about process which undermines the point of Parliament. So the forced withdrawal of the ‘programme motion’ — the guillotine — which probably looked to the outside world like a weird device made more incomprehensible by the fact that the second reading then won a large majority, was actually a classic assertion of the rights of Parliament against the executive.

•••

One consequence of the reform fiasco is the pivotal power it gives to Labour. Conservative government loyalists say that colleagues must vote for the reforms because only then will the Liberals vote for the boundary changes they desperately want. This is true, but Labour does not want these changes.