Thursday, 29 October 2009

House of Lords Standards Commissioner

I am available.
Posted by at

34 comments:

  1. Albert29 October 2009 at 14:15

    So am I.

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  2. Bertha29 October 2009 at 14:15

    I'm available too.

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  3. Carrie29 October 2009 at 14:15

    I could probably find the time.

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  4. David Lindsay29 October 2009 at 14:18

    Yes, Carrie, rather my thoughts. It would be very civilised. Pass the port.

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  5. Derren29 October 2009 at 14:18

    I don't think I can squeeze it in myself, but I'm pretty sure my mate Derek can.

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  6. Egbert29 October 2009 at 14:22

    I'm definitely available, and so are my friend Ernest, Eric and Edith.

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  7. Fred29 October 2009 at 14:28

    It sounds like there are a lot of us available. Who's the most qualified?

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  8. George29 October 2009 at 15:04

    I'm not available.

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  9. David Lindsay29 October 2009 at 16:13

    Let's all keep an eye out for the advertisement, then. Or have I missed something?

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  10. Hector29 October 2009 at 16:27

    I'm free, but I'm not sure I'm up to the job.

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  11. David Lindsay29 October 2009 at 16:28

    Don't write that on the form.

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  12. Iain29 October 2009 at 17:06

    Available, sure. But suitable? Competent? Relevantly experienced?

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  13. David Lindsay29 October 2009 at 17:09

    Well, we shall see, shan't we?

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  14. TP29 October 2009 at 17:10

    You are bad, Mr L. You are a bad, bad man. If all these things still required a stamp, you wouldn't bother. Curse the Internet.

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  15. Andy29 October 2009 at 17:11

    If you don't get it, you should re-apply to be a People's Peer.

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  16. David Lindsay29 October 2009 at 17:14

    No, TP, bless the Internet.

    Andy, see you after the General Election on that one. They have not made good their promise in April, of people from the North East, people who went to state schools, people with non-Oxbridge degrees, people born in the remaining British Overseas Territories generally and Saint Helena in particular, self-identifying mixed-race people, people who represent a return to the days when young men inherited their fathers’ seats in childhood or at birth and then took those seats at 21 (not an age for which I am in any danger of being mistaken in the flesh), and pro-life, pro-family, pro-worker, anti-war, economically social democratic, morally and socially conservative British and Commonwealth patriots.

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  17. Janet29 October 2009 at 17:25

    They have not made good their promise in April, of people from the North East, people who went to state schools, people with non-Oxbridge degrees, people born in the remaining British Overseas Territories generally and Saint Helena in particular, self-identifying mixed-race people, people who represent a return to the days when young men inherited their fathers’ seats in childhood or at birth and then took those seats at 21 (not an age for which I am in any danger of being mistaken in the flesh), and pro-life, pro-family, pro-worker, anti-war, economically social democratic, morally and socially conservative British and Commonwealth patriots.

    I missed that promise. Who made it?

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  18. David Lindsay29 October 2009 at 17:33

    The House of Lords Appointments Commission, in their very delayed "don't call us" letter to me, the application having gone in in October. I'm quoting from memory, although of course I still have it at home, but apparently "we have had a number of similar applications, but from more distinguished people". Perfectly possible. So, where are they?

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  19. Janet29 October 2009 at 17:34

    Seriously? They sent you a letter in which they promised to create peers who fulfilled all the criteria you list? I find that exceptionally unlikely - it would be great if you could put the letter up on your blog.

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  20. David Lindsay29 October 2009 at 17:38

    This has been discussed on here many times. They didn't use those words, of course. But they said "very similar", or something like that. Just more distinguished within being very similar.

    So far as I can tell, no one remotely similar to me, on any of the criteria that I listed apart perhaps from state schools and (far less probably) non-Oxbridge universities, has been given any of these - and remember, this is what they are - seats in Parliament.

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  21. Janet29 October 2009 at 17:47

    But that's very silly, David. Anyone can choose a set of criteria by which they are significantly different from anyone else - I certainly can. But at the same time, anyone can choose a set of criteria they have in common with plenty of other people. Of course very few candidates for the peerage were born in St Helena, for example, but that isn't a good reason for you to be a peer. The question is, would you make a good peer? I've seen no evidence, reading this blog, that you would.

    Also, I'm not sure how you "represent a return to the days when young men inherited their fathers’ seats in childhood or at birth and then took those seats at 21".

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  22. David Lindsay29 October 2009 at 17:55

    The removal of the hereditaries has massively upped the age profile (just as it has also made the Lords massively more Londonised). Peers did not always used to be old. It used to be not uncommon for them to half a generation younger than I am now, and peers around my current age were quite normal.

    Those were the things that I set out in my application. They said that they'd had lots of applications from people like me, only more distinguished. I say, fine. But where are they, then? None of them has been given a peerage.

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  23. John29 October 2009 at 17:56

    Janet doesn't think anyone is fit to sit in either House with opinions different from her own. She's probably on some New Labour/New Tory candidates list. Only women can be.

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  24. Pete29 October 2009 at 17:56

    I applied to be a peer, on the grounds that I live in a 2 bedroom house. I bet no one who gets it lives in anything less than a mansion, but I didn't get anywhere.

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  25. David Lindsay29 October 2009 at 17:57

    But did they write back saying that lots of people with two-bedroom houses had applied, only they were more distinguished than you, Pete?

    John, spot on. And it's the same list, of course.

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  26. Rod29 October 2009 at 17:58

    Well given your application form's qualities included er, going to a state school, being a parish councillor, being a school governor, I imagine lots of people did those things.

    The fact that at the same time as those you have lots of totally irrelevant qualities to the peerage - like being from St Helena - is neither here nor there.

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  27. Jim29 October 2009 at 17:59

    It's the philosohy and policy thing more than anything. You represent a strand of opinion widely shared in the country at large but no longer represented by in the parliamentary process.

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  28. David Lindsay29 October 2009 at 18:03

    Actually, Rod, how many people who have ever done any of those three things have been ennobled since this April, or even since last October? And the British Overseas Territories are now few, but supremely loyal. Yet no one born in any of the remaining ones sits in either House, and no one born in Saint Helena has ever done so. That won't do. Will it? Not to those paid to keep PC scores, one would have thought.

    Never fear, Jim. I am standing for the Commons. There will be others. And, of course, the House of Lords Appointments Commission has received lots of applications from distinguished people (such as certainly abound) who are economically social democratic, morally and socially conservative British and Commonwealth patriots. It has told me so.

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  29. Tim29 October 2009 at 18:08

    You're not just anyone any more. Haven't been for quite a while really. Arguably never really were. You're on the up generally, even from where you were before. The argument that you represent widespread but disenfranchised opinion is a powerful one. A year after the election I'd expect you in one house or the other. Only remains to see which.

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  30. Malcolm Clarke29 October 2009 at 20:46

    The words have it, the words have it. Order. Order. Lol

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  31. man of the people30 October 2009 at 11:27

    If anyone from StH was ever going to be made a lord it was always going to be someone from your family. And now you seem to have cast yourself as the voice of the pit villages because your dad was vicar of one after being archdeacon of St. Helena. I have looked up where you've lived for the 20 years since he died. It is a middle-class enclave which never had a pit.

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  32. Anonymous30 October 2009 at 11:42

    I can confirm that. He comes from the most prominent civic family over there bar none. His father was also very active in such circles during his long sojourn on the world's most beautiful island.

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  33. Old Hack30 October 2009 at 12:01

    You would only have put in this application to write a little article about the experience somewhere. But they did this and now you have the makings of a proper story.

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  34. David Lindsay30 October 2009 at 12:43

    Old Hack, oh yes...

    Man of the People, there is always a banner at the Durham Big Meeting saying Lanchester and showing Lanchester Parish Church, but the people from elsewhere who now have it just seem to have inherited it, and don't know anything about it. No, there was never a bit in Lanchester (there were of course numerous round about). Yet there is this banner. Very odd.

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