On Friday Johann Hari caused quite a storm through
his article in the Independent on reform of the House of Lords. It read every bit like something from the National Secular Society, and actually ended with a link to join the NSS and the British Humanist Association.
Whilst purporting to be an argument in favour of a fully elected upper chamber, Hari forgot to argue for that and instead launched an all out attack on the integrity of the 26 Lords Spiritual - the bishops who are given a seat in the House of Lords. He neglected to argue in favour of a democratic option and instead attacked the bishops for turning out to "hurt" the poor and vulnerable.
Extraordinary.
Mouse has said on a number of occasions before that he doesn't support the bishops automatic place in the Lords, however, Hari chose not to attack the bishops on democratic grounds, but on the basis that they "oppose almost all the progressive changes in our history". The article becomes a deeply personal attack on the character of the bishops, in which Hari argues they do not deserve to be in Parliament on the basis of their character, rather than on sound principles.
What got on Mouse's whiskers most was the gross inaccuracy of much of the article, so has done a quick fact check on the central charge outlined above. Mouse will not put his own views across here, but simply state the relevant facts, and leave it for you to decide whether Hari's arguments hold water.
Since the argument made is based on the parliamentary voting record of the bishops, it is a matter of public record and therefore very easy to check. Mouse's source for the facts below was
The Public Whip.
Here goes:
Today, the bishops claim they are really motivated by concern for the poor and vulnerable. But which two bills have brought them out to vote in largest numbers in recent years? The first was to vote against the Equality Bil
The facts:
1. There are two possible Equality Acts which Hari could be talking about. The most recent and most controversial was the 2010 Bill. None of the bishops voted against this. As such it is more likely that Hari is referring to the 2006 Bill, on which just three bishops voted.
2. The highest number of Bishops to vote during the passage of the 2010 Bill was 8 - out of 26. True this is a high number relative to recent voting patterns for the Lords Spiritual, but hardly a mass turnout. These votes were for a number of amendments to the Bill. On each occasion the bishops voted with the majority in the Lords and the amendments were subsequently accepted by the government.
3. With regard to the 2006 Bill,
only three bishops voted against it, on the grounds that it may lead to religious preachers being prosecuted for homophobia if they taught that homosexuality was a sin, and that it would force Catholic adoption agencies to close unless they went against church teachings and placed children with gay couples.
4. An amendment to exclude sexual orientation from the Bill
was voted on by one bishop.
5. The claim that this issue has brought out the bishops in their greatest number is clearly untrue, as only three of them voted on this bill.
The bishops rallied and railed to keep it legal for people to effectively hang signs saying "No Gays" outside their shops, charities and hotels. They even threatened to shut down services helping the poor if they were required to give them to gay people – suggesting their much bragged-about opposition to poverty is pretty shallow.
The facts:
1. If this is a reference to the 2010 Bill it is clearly untrue, as discrimination on the basis of sexuality was outlawed in the 2007 Act.
2. The "rallied and railed" comment is strange in reference to the 2006 bill, given Mouse's earlier observation that only three of them actually voted.
3. The "threatened to shut down services helping the poor" comment is most likely a reference to Catholic adoption agencies. The threat was not that they would shut down services in retaliation at the Bill, but merely that Catholic adoption agencies simply cannot operate on that basis. Something which has now been borne out, as they have now all either closed or lost their Catholic identity.
4. It is probably worth noting that there was an amendment in the 2010 Bill which removed the legal bar on holding civil partnerships in religious premises. On this amendment only one bishop voted.
The bishops' second greatest passion is to prevent you from being able to choose to end your suffering if you are dying. Some 81 per cent of British people believe that if you are terminally ill and can't bear to live any longer in an agony that won't cease, you should be allowed to ask a doctor to help you end it. If you believe this is "evil" – as the bishops do – that's fine: you can choose to stay alive to the bitter end, no matter how awful the pain becomes. That's your right. But for the bishops, that's not enough. They want to impose their conviction on the rest of us.
The facts:
1. Mouse assumes by this, Hari is referring to the Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill Bill. This was cut by the Lords Committee managing the bill before the 2005 general election after they concluded that there was no time for it, and was
effectively blocked in 2006 when the House of Lords voted to delay the bill by six months, making the Parliamentary timetable impossible again.
2. In the vote to delay the bill
14 bishops voted, all in favour of the delay. The amendment was passed with a majority of 48, so their votes did not decide the outcome of the division.
3. The voting on the delay motion was split right across party lines, with the motion passing with support from all parties - there was no reactionary conservative element holding it up, but 26 Labour peers, including Lords Winston and Lord Adonis, and 14 Lib Dem peers, including 7 front-benchers, supporting the delay. The Lords raised a wide range of concerns about the bill as drafted.
4. The bill was a private members bill, so its failure was ultimately the result of a lack of government support which would have guaranteed it's passage through parliament.
There is, of course, a rider to all of this that is the fact that the House of Lords cannot over-rule the House of Commons in any event. As such, the bishops simply cannot change the will of the House of Commons, unless they do so through the power of their argument. Arguments about "imposing" their will don't really add up in this context.
There were a number of other factual errors throughout the article, such as the claim that the bishops owe their place in the Lords to Henry VIII and the misquoting of the ICM poll on the role of bishops in the Lords, but they were incidental to Hari's argument, so Mouse will not bother to correct them.
Mouse's conclusion to all this is that the argument lacks facts to support it, and as such falls well short of Hari's standards and even further short of the Independent's standards.
To suggest that a vote by three bishops represents their biggest obsession, for which they campaigned hard, is clearly ridiculous however strongly you disagree with those three votes. But to suggest that they are actively seeking to hurt the poor and vulnerable is simply a needless and baseless insult.
In future Hari should stop attacking bishops, and start arguing for democracy.
