The bovver boys in ermine have been getting the boot in (copyright, Denis Skinner) to the EU Withdrawal Bill as it passes through their House. So we were curious to see how support for the Lords stands among Conservative Party members.
The answer is that less than one in three of them back the Upper House as it is presently made up.
Two in five want an elected element in the Lords in some way – though support for both options put to our panel is low. Just over one in four want a part-elected/part-appointed hybrid. About one in six want a full-blooded wholly elected chamber.
And just over one in five want what Lord Hailsham (not the present model: his father) used to call an elective dictatorship!
Yes, slightly over a quarter favour the option usually associated with Marxists – namely, to scrap the Upper Chamber altogether, and have no check on the Commons at all.
All in all, Tory members don’t like the Lords much at the moment. But they can’t agree on what should be done about it.