Reforming the Lords

I am pessimistic about Lords reform. The coalition agreement only commits the government to bring forward proposals. The massed ranks of Tory backwoodsmen with the vociferous support of the old Labour dinosaurs (I see Betty Boothroyd has joined their ranks)are digging in to oppose reform and shamefully there are even Liberal Democrat peers (step forward David Steel) who will vote with them. It was heartening then to read Paddy Ashdown's speech. kindly circulated by Keynesian Liberal.

One hundred years after a Liberal government began to reform the Lords, the work remains unfinished. If their lordships refuse to go quietly, then the government must use the Parliament Act. It's high time we became a democracy and no more talk of grandfathering, letting them all stay until they die. No along with Cromwell let us say, "You have sat too long for any good you have been doing lately... Depart, I say; and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!"