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What about the Lords?

Mark D'Arcy | 14:29 UK time, Tuesday, 11 May 2010

My spies tell me that when the Lib Dem MPs discussed coalitions and all that, only seven of the Lib Dem peers were admitted to the conclave.

That might turn out to be a mistake. Because not only does a coalition government, of whatever makeup, need to win votes in the Commons, but also in the Lords, where they are rather more used to no party commanding a majority.

It matters because there is no guarantee that their Lordships would automatically accept that, in the end, a government would have to get its business.

In "normal" circumstances, a party commanding a majority in the Commons can rely on the 1945 Addison-Salisbury convention, which says that the Lords will pass anything that was in the winning party's election manifesto, and was therefore sanctioned by the electorate.

But that convention does not extend to compromise proposals hammered out in a hung Parliament, with the aim of enticing parties into coalition. Labour's bargaining proposal for reforming the voting system, and enacting a change to Alternative Vote (AV) without even a referendum might entice the Lib Dem leadership, but, according to a senior Lords source, would never be passed by the upper House.

It wasn't in any manifesto and a majority of peers would see it as playing fast and loose with the constitution.

A large number of Labour peers who are implacably opposed to electoral reform would join forces with Conservatives and crossbenchers, and a future coalition would be thrown into chaos. The same scenario could surface on a variety of proposals from a variety of possible coalitions.

A majority in the Commons is not the only majority coalition-builders should be worrying about.

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