General
Monday, 06 February 2012 05:59
By a Newsnet reporter
SNP Constitutional Affairs spokesperson Pete Wishart MP has called for peers convicted and imprisoned for serious offences to be removed from the House of Lords.
Mr Wishart’s call comes after Fred Goodwin was stripped of his knighthood for his role in the collapse of the Royal Bank of Scotland, although no criminal offence was committted.
Mr Wishart said current proposals in the draft House of Lords reform bill, which suggests that convicted peers could be suspended for an indefinite period, did not go far enough. The MP said it was time the House of Lords was brought in to line with the Commons – where any MP given a sentence of more than a year is automatically expelled.
Mr Wishart said the precedent had already been set and suggested that a 1917 law, the Deprivation of Titles Act, which was passed to remove peerages from the Duke of Cumberland and the Duke of Albany, who supported Germany in WW1, could be amended. There have been cases of members of the nobility losing their titles, for example after the Jacobite rebellion.
The House of Lords contains a number of so-called ‘nobles’ who have been convicted of criminal offences which would seriously prejudice their chances of continuing employment in any other professional sphere. The roll of shame includes:
Mike Watson, former Labour MSP for Glasgow Cathcart, who was charged with two counts of arson after a private reception at Edinburgh’s Prestonfield Hotel following the Scottish Politician of the Year awards in November 2004. Watson pled guilty to the first count, and not guilty to the second. The court accepted his not guilty plea on the second charge.
Watson was sentenced to 16 months in prison by Sheriff Kathrine Mackie, who noted that the Labour peer had offered no mitigation or explanation. In the view of the sherrif, there was a “significant risk” that Watson would re-offend and warned him that alcohol was no excuse for his behaviour. Watson retains the title ‘Baron Watson of Invergowrie’, and continues to attend the House of Lords regularly to take part in debates and influence legislation.
In 1993, while Labour MP for Cumnock and Labour’s shadow defence spokesman, George Foulkes was convicted of being drunk and disorderly and assaulting a police officer. At the time of the offence, Foulkes was on his way to take part in an important vote in the House of Commons. A witness at the trial described Foulkes as being like “Zebedee on acid”. He spent a night in police custody and was fined £1,050.
Foulkes appeared to believe that being drunk was no reason not to act as a legislator, influencing the lives of British citizens in important matters. The Labour party, despite the incident, granted Foulkes the title ‘Baron Foulkes of Cumnock’ in 2005. Foulkes is active in the House of Lords, most recently making a series of amendments to the Scotland Bill in an attempt to reduce the powers of Holyrood. Foulkes would not be forced to step down from the Lords should members of the upper house be subject to the same restrictions as MPs, as he was not sentenced to more than 12 months in prison.
Jeffrey Archer, pulp-novelist, one-time Conservative MP and former chairman of the Conservative party, was awarded the title Baron Archer of Weston-super-Mare. In 2000 Archer was convicted of perjury and perverting the course of justice for lying in court during a libel case he’d taken out against the Star newspaper. Archer was sentenced to 3 years in prison. Archer retains his title and although expelled from the party he remains influential within Conservative circles.
Conservative peer John Taylor, ‘Baron Taylor of Warwick’, was convicted of six counts of fraudulent accounting relating to his Parliamentary expenses. In May 2011 he was sentenced to 12 months in prison. Taylor is currently on home release and under a curfew order. He was suspended from the House of Lords for 12 months, but will be free to return after May 2012.
Conrad Black, former propietor of the Daily Telegraph, was awarded the title Baron Black of Crossharbour by Tony Blair in 2001. In 2007 Black was convicted in a US court for diverting company money for his own personal use, and for obstruction of justice. Black was sentenced to 78 months. He was released in July 2010, but later reimprisoned after losing an appeal against two of his original convictions. He is currently serving out the remaining period of his sentence in the Federal Correctional Facility, Miami. Black is due for release toward the end of this year. Once released, Black will be free to take up his seat in the House of Lords.
Commenting, Mr Wishart said:
“The removal of Fred Goodwin’s knighthood has properly focused attention on standards in public life and in particular the conduct of those who have been bestowed with honours.
“It is ridiculous that peers, convicted and imprisoned for serious criminal offences can retain, not just their title, but their seat and privileges in the House of Lords. In circumstances where an MP would be disqualified and lose their seat, for Lords it really is a case of one law for them and another for the rest of us.
“Proposals within the draft Lords reform bill simply do not go far enough. It is time the House of Lords was brought in to line with the Commons – and that any peer convicted of a serious criminal offence should face expulsion and the forfeiture of their title.
“The precedence has already been set, and it may be that the 1917 Deprivation of Titles Act, which was passed to remove titles from peers who supported Germany in WW1, could be amended.
“Before David Cameron and Nick Clegg stuff the Lords with even more cronies, they should create some space by getting rid of those peers who have broken the law yet continue to make the law for the rest of us.”
Comments
2012-02-06 07:34
That they can remain Lords after breaking the law so spectacularly is wrong.
Vote for Independence and we shall never have anything to do with them again.
2012-02-06 13:26
SNP could be really naughty here and recommend him to fulfill Lord Strathclyde’s recently stated wishes.
Tommy the Commie would be a right ferret amongst the ermine fermin. Get Gorgious George in there as well, after all they have both already done a stint in a ‘second house’ and one with more influence on public opinion.
2012-02-06 07:40
2012-02-06 09:42
2012-02-06 08:15
As if that’s what their Granny voted Labour for.
2012-02-06 08:57
2012-02-06 08:57
What’s wrong with the proper Scots legal term fireraising?
Sorry, not wanting to be pedantic!
2012-02-06 09:41
2012-02-06 09:45
2012-02-06 10:12
It really is time to clear this whole mess of privilege, toadying and troughing out and replace it with a proper, representative modern democracy.
2012-02-06 10:24
How can the UK, or an independent Scotland come to that, call itself a representative democracy when the head of state is chosen not by a free ballot but by a random act of sexual congress?
That is a disgraceful slur on our royal family. They do not engage in ‘random acts of sexual congress’. Every act of sexual congress they engage in is planned according to strict rules of protocol, choreographed by the appropriate officials and witnessed by the Groom of the Royal Bedchamber and the Archbishop of Canterbury.
2012-02-06 10:15
2012-02-06 10:42
2012-02-06 12:24
Can anyone explain as to why a religious group such as the Church of England has this automatic right to have their Archbishops and Bishops sit in the upper house of the United Kingdom?
What actually gives them the god given right to do so?
Do they represent anyone in Scotland? NO, Do they represent any other part of the UK, other than England NO
So why do they sit their taking judgement on matters that are not English
Its rich that the English have a gripe (and rightly so) that Scottish MP’s vote on England only matters. Then why do we have English Clerics vote on matters that affect Scotland
This to me is another reason why the union with England must end
2012-02-06 11:01
2012-02-06 11:06
We told you so, Osborne.
What is Longannet’s future? Now that’s the question.This is a good one Brian Wilson saying it was AS fault the carbon capture was cancelled.
Why we need a UK National Oil Company
Offshore Cuba drilling arouses anger in Florida
These are all to be found in the Energy section of the P&J.no; link as you have to pay but I’m sure NNS can have a look all very interesting and some other great articles there.
2012-02-06 12:33
I would like to share some of his thoughts about, ironically enough, Cuba.
guardian.co.uk/…/cuba.world
“But for me, that visit was the start of a life-long love affair. There is no need to confuse that statement with uncritical acclaim for everything about the place. But criticism should never ignore the fact that Cuba’s primary service to the world has been to provide living proof that it is possible to conquer poverty, disease and illiteracy in a country that was grossly over-familiar with all three. That is a pretty big service. The fact that it has been delivered in the face of sustained hostility from an obsessive neighbour makes it all the more stunning.“
2012-02-06 13:03
One set of rules for one and another set for. . . . Aye!
2012-02-06 15:53
2012-02-06 16:37
2012-02-06 11:09
2012-02-06 11:09
And if simply being an ****-wipe is sufficient cause then this leaves the matter of Lord Foulkes to be explained.
Comment edited by NNS Mod Team
2012-02-06 11:49
Exactly EH. None do hypocrisy quite like the British Establishment and dollops of it at that. That Westminster deems the unelected House of Lords fit for a so called democracy when its actually more befitting of a banana republic is clear to all. I have no doubt Scotland will leave these archaic and corrupt institutions belonging to that nation trailing in its wake when we are finally free of London rule. Wishing the vote was tomorrow.
2012-02-06 12:32
It isn’t the lamb we want, it’s the whole establishment flock and the thinking that reared it we want to be rid of.
2012-02-06 13:17
Further all the land needs to be liberated and repatriated.
2012-02-06 13:30
2012-02-06 13:41
2012-02-06 14:35
Here is a link:
guardian.co.uk/…/…
I didn’t find it amusing either to be honest, usually Mr Lee does hit my funny bone, I have been constantly exposed to such comments online during this debate though. Perhaps that makes it less amusing for me.
2012-02-06 14:45
Stuff White Brits Like Nº 72 : Stewart Lee
stuffwhitebritslike.co.uk/…/…
I was going to comment more fully on Lee’s, ahem, ‘humour’, but looking at 20 pages of comments I lost the will to live.
2012-02-06 23:03
I was going to comment more fully on Lee’s, ahem, ‘humour’, but looking at 20 pages of comments I lost the will to live.
Not to worry, I dropped in on his swipe at Salmond and left him this –
“Post-Treaty Of Union”, arrangements will not see the existing, “Her Majesty’s Parliament of the United Kingdom”, at Westminster magically turn itself into, “Her Majesty’s Parliament of England”, with the wave of Her Majesty’s magic sceptre. I’ll tell you why. The pre-Treaty of Union England incorporated both the Principality of Wales, plus the English monarch wore the Irish crown, (by an act of the Irish Parliament). However, all were subjects of His/Her Majesty King/Queen of, “Greater England”, who was sovereign. In Scotland, “The People of Scotland were/are sovereign. Now there were but TWO equal sovereign countries that signed that Treaty Of Union and it is that sovereignty that will govern how all assets of, “The Parliament of The United Kingdom of Great Britain”, will be proportioned between the two equal sovereign countries, (and it may not be on a per capita basis). In a constitutional monarchy sovereign powers are delegated to the elected representatives of the people. In England that is the King/Queen of England but in Scotland the People are sovereign and the Monarch is chosen by them. They also have legal right to dismiss a monarch who does not look after their sovereign interests. That obviously then also applies to the delegated elected representtives. So what happens when the Scots leave the Union? Quite simply – two partners and one leaves – no more union. But wait! England now has NO legal Parliament as the elected members were elected to, “Her Majesty’s United Kingdom Parliament”, and that is no more. Furthermore, at the Union the Great Seals of England and Scotland were destroyed and replaced with, “Her Majesty’s Grand Seal of The United Kingdom”, and Parliamentary Acts are not legal unless they bear that legal seal. Neither is the Parliament if it does not bear the Royal Seal of approval. So there is NO English Parliament, No Great Seal of England. NO legally elected Members. The only way to get a legal parliament is for her Majesty to summon someone to form, “Her Majesty’s English Parliament”, but there are NO legally elected members and the Civil Service is NOT England’s and there is no legal seal. In Scotland there is a legally elected Parliament, A Great Seal of Scotland, a Sceptre and other artefacts of sovereignty and the Sovereign People of Scotland have elected a legal parliament and given them a massive mandate. What is more, when MSP Winnie Ewing made a statement in the presence of Her Majesty on the opening day of Holyrood it went like this, the 79-year-old MSP said: “I want to start with the words that I have always wanted either to say or to hear someone else say – the Scottish Parliament, which adjourned on March 25, 1707, is hereby reconvened.” To date that statement has never been challenged, it is legal. Winnie didn’t open a new parliament, she reconvened the old one quite LEGALLY. Laugh that off Stewart and Clever Clogs Cameron
2012-02-06 14:33
Highlight the web address at the top of the page and click your right mouse button, selecting Copy from the menu.
You can then paste it in here using the same method.
Ctrl C, followed by Crtl V does the same thing.
2012-02-06 14:48
I’d give the link – but I don’t know how to do that!
It’s very easy, just copy and paste the link, it appears as a link automatically when you publish your comment.
2012-02-06 18:42
Off topic but has everyone read the hysterical, scotophobic rant by Stewart Lee in yesterday’s Observer? I’d give the link – but I don’t know how to do that!
Stewart Lee is a very clever boy. So clever, in fact, that he cannot think of any case to explain to the English why England are so keen to get rid of those fried Mars Bar eating, drug users, sheep asaulting Scots who are so bone idle that they have sponged on the English tax payer who have had to support them since England bailed them out after the Darian Expedition.
Now that’s quite strang as the English don’t have a Treasury or parliament of their own. You see I’m just one of those ignorant Scots who are too poor, too wee and too bloody stupid to be able to run my own country. You see I can’tunderstand how that country down south can be subsidising wee Scotland when big England have been in fiscal deficit for years, Oh! Wait! I’m too bloody stupid to know what being in fiscal deficit means. Anyway, I’m still too stupid to understand how a wee counntry of benefit grabbers can live in a wee country that has returned a surplus in 5 of the last 6 financial periods while that big rich country that subsidises us manages to do that and still manage to run up a £3 Trillion national debt. Those English taxpapers are really clever. I wish I was clever enough to subsidise my neighbour while I ran up a massive debt – right good trick that.
If the numptie was one thousandth as clever as he thinks himself he would still be as daft as a brush.
2012-02-07 11:13
www.youtube.com/…/
The auld addage, ‘many a true word spoken in jest.’ I think he has some real issues percolating away somewhere under that veneer of humour.
Quite redolent of a certain Mr Henderson in fact.
2012-02-06 14:55
2012-02-06 15:04
The problem in terms of serious debate is that Scots have been discussing these issues longer than my entire lifetime – and I’m gray and baldie these days. In England the discussion has only just begun, so they are decades behind us. They’re still at the “ethnic nationalism” stage which we laid to rest back in the 1970s.
2012-02-06 19:58
My partner is English and I have English family. My elder daughter, who lives in London and has an English accent, told me recently that she’s a “closet Scot” because she’s afraid of the abuse she’d get if her friends and schoolmates knew her dad was Scottish and an independentista .
The problem in terms of serious debate is that Scots have been discussing these issues longer than my entire lifetime – and I’m gray and baldie these days. In England the discussion has only just begun, so they are decades behind us. They’re still at the “ethnic nationalism” stage which we laid to rest back in the 1970s.
We laid it to rest long before that.
2012-02-06 15:19
2012-02-06 15:47
1: Her Grace Elisabeth Queen of Scots dishes out the Titles.
2: She could I think still dish out Titles but would the rUK allow what are essentially therefore representatives of a foreign land to sit in their legislature ?
3: If she continues to dish out “Scottish” Titles, No place for “Scottish” peers in legislature of Independent Scotland unless elected to Parly as MSP.
4: Compare and Contrast with “Irish” Peers – 1922 – Irish Free State – No Irish Peers allowed to sit in Valley of Dinosaurs after Independence.
5: Why would the situation be any different in 2016 ?
So, The Life Peers and in particular The Unholy Trinity, Ffoulkes, Fforsyth and Tankerness could call themselves what they wanted. It “may” be recognised in England but it would be up to the People and Parliament of Scotland whether or not Foreign Titles would be in any way recognised.
NOW, however, what about the “old” Hereditary Titles recognised under the old Scottish Parliament from pre-1707 ? e.g. Earldoms of Mar, Sutherland, etc. What do we do about those, if anything ?
2012-02-06 17:43
2012-02-06 15:46
Labour councillor banned over comments about nine-year-old ‘rape’ victim
news.stv.tv/…/…
2012-02-06 20:07
O/T but this story should be receiving a great deal more publicity. It’s pretty hidden away on the STV site
Labour councillor banned over comments about nine-year-old ‘rape’ victim
news.stv.tv/…/…
Old story. The Labourites have just taken a very long time to do anything about it and they should have thrown him out permenantly but have not.
2012-02-06 22:07
2012-02-06 17:24
Scotland new independent State. Unthinkable? Not at all!
Telling facts, by Pascal Lorot
> E-newspaper format
Will Scotland join Europe tomorrow as sovereign State? With a population of a little more than 5 million inhabitants, Alba (Scotland, in Gaelic) Scots ahead many European countries (Cyprus, Ireland, Malta, Luxembourg, Slovenia and the three Baltic States) and would be playing with the Denmark, the Finland or the Slovakia. Wealth per capita, for its part, the place before most of the States members of the Union to Central and Eastern Europe. An independent Scotland would thus constitute a European State of quite honourable size. But we are not yet there.
Over the past two decades, pro-independence sentiment had constantly progress in Scotland. Under popular pressure, Westminster was taken to grant more rights to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. This is what is called the devolution. The “Scotland Act” of 1998 created – restored would say some – a Scottish Parliament. The previous had been dissolved in 1707 with the final integration of Scotland in the United Kingdom.
Pro-independence current intensified substantially during the various consultations (1999, 2003, 2007) for, for the first time in its history, in the elections of May 2011, the absolute majority in Parliament. Meanwhile, the Scottish pro-independence components had grouped and organized a party advocating separation from England, the Scottish National Party or SNP, and an iconic leader, Alex Salmond.
This is already some time, he announced the holding of a referendum on the independence of the province during the fall of 2014. Beginning January 2012, pushed by the right, Premier British David Cameron tried to regain control by confirming the idea of the referendum but it would be current 2013 and have a clear question: Yes or no to Scotland in the United Kingdom? The iron arm seems today committed.
Why side independentist set on the fall of 2014? For some, it’s a date symbol because it is the anniversary of the Scottish victory of Bannockburn in 1314. For others, it is both technical (it must let the Commonwealth Games held in Scotland this year) and political. Number of Scottish officials bet in effect on the deepening of the recession in the United Kingdom and think that the Scots will be more receptive to the idea of independence at this time here over the next year.
Finally, another object of the arm of iron with London, the wording of the question will have its importance. Today, the idea of independence of Scotland attracted only a large minority of people. By claiming a semi-independence over NET and Frank independence, i.e. by requesting the transfer of a maximum of Scottish skills, Alex Salmond is satisfied to win. And then, once winner Yes, push the country little by little, but without delay, towards total independence.
This is the reason for which it seeks to reassure the more hesitant: New Scotland would retain the pound sterling as currency and the Queen as sovereign. Not to mention, and this reality is to reinforce the more hesitant that Scotland is an oil power, that it has the 6th place financial in Europe and that its economic and industrial potential is significant, in any case more than many other European States. Viva Alba!
2012-02-06 17:36
Could it possibly be that Cochrane actually was aware of this, but was happy to make himself appear stupid in order to attack our First Minister? He should be advised that, while the former was rather more successful than he might have wished, the latter failed at the first hurdle of credibility.
2012-02-06 17:27
As for Earls etc. and various other hereditary titles I see no need of them in a modern democracy.
2012-02-06 18:24
It is possible, however unlikely, that it could be negotiated to offer a continued involvement in Scottish politics.
Obviously the vast majority of the electorate, including myself, are diametrically opposed to the chamber and everything it stands for, so I wouldnt put a bet on it.
I wouldnt put it passed the Tories and Labour however to disagree, as we all know they’ll be grubbing around as ever trying to maintain any semblence of control that they can.
2012-02-06 19:23
en.wikipedia.org/…/…
This is going to be very tricky :))))
2012-02-06 19:36
2012-02-06 20:19
2012-02-06 18:07
Lardy Foulkes is trying to bring the SNP down at all times, get shot of him, criminal.
2012-02-06 19:53
Anybody got a good design for business cards with newsnetscotland design?
Vista print (google) are doing 500 for £5 at the moment.
Now is the time to spread the word.
Be prepared folks.