Islam Times - ‘Unelected Lords push UK backwards’

Islam Times - The British Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has admitted the system of handpicking members of the House of Lords by the monarch puts Britain in the same ranks as the third-world African nations like Burkina Faso.

Clegg said in a communiqué to his party that there are only 15 nations worldwide with largely unelected upper houses of parliament "putting Britain in the same league as Jordan, Belize and Burkina Faso".

Clegg also said during a meeting with a special joint committee of both houses of parliament that Egyptian protestors in Tahrir Square in Cairo would be shocked to find out Britain appoints people to the House of Lords.

The committee is tasked with examining the government’s proposals for cutting the number of Lords from 800 to around 300 elected members who would serve for a single 15-year term.

This comes as the peers threatened less than two weeks ago to go on strike if the government pushes ahead with its plans to slide the country toward democracy.

The peers also said they would sabotage any move to replace the current system in which the monarch appoints the majority of the Lords with a system based on a public vote.

At the time, the peers’ mutiny came as Prime Minister David Cameron said “the House of Lords performs its work well but lacks sufficient democratic authority.”

The Lords’ reform has been especially controversial in Britain as some believe it would eventually lead to an elected head of state and the abolition of monarchy in Britain.

"If it is desirable to elect both the Commons and Lords, changing the name to Senate, why should there not be a direct election for head of state, thus embracing all three parts of the constitution with directly elected representatives?” Labour veteran Sir Stuart Bell said back in July.