• This topic has 28 replies, 21 voices, and was last updated 12 years ago by j_me.
Viewing 29 posts - 1 through 29 (of 29 total)
  • Should peers be stripped of peerages if convicted of naughtiness?
  • richcc
    Free Member

    Just heard on radio about Lord Taylor(?) getting 12 months for fiddling expenses. I must admit I thought this when Jeffrey Archer got sent down too. If you get convicted of a crime then you should lose your peerage – what do you reckon?

    CaptainFlashheart
    Free Member

    I reckon a criminal offence is a little more than “naughtiness”.

    willard
    Full Member

    Simple answer: Yes, I think they should be.

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    Cougar
    Full Member

    We-ell,

    What you’re proposing there is different punishments for different classes of people. Is that really what you want to see?

    CaptainFlashheart
    Free Member

    What you’re proposing there is different punishments for different classes of people.

    Oh no, not this again…..

    vinnyeh
    Full Member

    What you’re proposing there is different punishments for different classes of people. Is that really what you want to see?

    How do you figure that, unless it’s meant as a play on words?

    Other ‘types’ of people can be barred for misbehaviour- accountants, solicitors, company directors etc.

    roper
    Free Member

    I think Jeffrey Archer is a very good example of British nobility and suits his peerage very well.

    BermBandit
    Free Member

    I think Jeffrey Archer is a very good example of British nobility and suits his peerage very well.

    Surely that should be nobility with a “k”?

    kevin1911
    Full Member

    I think all peers should be stripped of their peerages anyway, but for committing a criminal offence, especially fiddling their expenses as a peer, they should definitely be stripped of it. And made to pay it all back, twice!

    Cougar
    Full Member

    How do you figure that, unless it’s meant as a play on words?

    Any crime comes with an assorted punishment, does it not? If people with peerages are stripped of their peerage and commoners are not (because they don’t have one), then you’re either treating peers more harshly or reducing their sentences in other areas. Should peers get larger punishments than commoners?

    Cougar
    Full Member

    Oh no, not this again…..

    I don’t know what you mean by this, but I’m using the word “class” purely to differentiate between peers and commoners.

    uplink
    Free Member

    IMO – anyone convicted of a crime that could carry a prison sentence should be barred from public service for a period of time and lose any financial or material benefits that come with it

    I don’t mean people’s professions, I mean people like MPs Peers, councillors etc.

    richcc
    Free Member

    As I see it, peers (of the realm) are in some way representing the rest of us, differentiated by their titles and supposed to be ‘special’. Once a convicted crim, then you’ve shown yourself not to be worthy of this and any priveleges it brings.

    BermBandit
    Free Member

    Its the whole issue with the class system. It all relys on the concept that the hereditary lot and those at the pinnicle are in some way special. The validity of the whole system collapses when it becomes self evident that they are not.

    Personally I think to err is Human, so to pretend to be infallible should therefore automatically disqualify you from high office. So in a roundabout sort of way I’m getting to the point where I think our top people should really just be treated like everyone else, otherwise its perpetuating the myth.

    yunki
    Free Member

    no they shouldn’t… it takes all sorts to make a world..

    jon1973
    Free Member

    I don’t know what you mean by this, but I’m using the word “class” purely to differentiate between peers and commoners.

    Who are you calling common?

    [spits on the floor and swears in disgust]

    D0NK
    Full Member

    Should peers be stripped of peerages if convicted of naughtiness?

    Yes!

    Junkyard
    Free Member

    Any crime comes with an assorted punishment, does it not? If people with peerages are stripped of their peerage and commoners are not (because they don’t have one), then you’re either treating peers more harshly or reducing their sentences in other areas. Should peers get larger punishments than commoners?

    As you note you cannot have something taken from you if you dont have it. Banning all criminals from being a peer would not affect everyone but the punishment would be universally applied. For example fraud stops you being an accountant or a compaany director etc. Again this law wont affect everyone from doing their normal job but will affect only some still it is universally applied.

    BermBandit
    Free Member

    For example fraud stops you being an accountant or a compaany director

    you obviously don’t know the ones I know!

    joemarshall
    Free Member

    Any crime comes with an assorted punishment, does it not? If people with peerages are stripped of their peerage and commoners are not (because they don’t have one), then you’re either treating peers more harshly or reducing their sentences in other areas. Should peers get larger punishments than commoners?

    Lots of jobs come with the proviso that you can’t do them if committed of certain crimes.

    For example, exactly the same argument you suggest could be used to argue that convicted paedophiles should still be allowed to become teachers, after all if they were taxi drivers (say), they could still continue their job after prison – should teachers get larger punishments than taxi drivers?

    midlifecrashes
    Full Member

    So what if the queen, or one of our future kings get convicted of something. Will they be barred from their job? And who by?

    The problem with our monarchy and aristocracy is that in the modern era there is no logic to it, and once you start to tinker with it to bring logic into it, where would you stop? Presumably with a republic.

    Wouldn’t stop my neighbour being a countess and heiress to a couple of earldoms and owning significant chunks of the county, or the woman a few doors down being a shoo-in for the upper chamber for “services” to John Prescott and being Labour chief “whip”, complete with dodgy expenses claim for soundproofing her bedroom!

    Stoner
    Free Member

    should teachers get larger punishments than taxi drivers?

    they do dont they under the “abuse of position” kind of thing?

    konabunny
    Free Member

    Just as a theoretical aside: one of the things you have to worry about when you start stripping people who have a role in the political process of their right to play that role is the prospect of politically-motivated prosecutions. This is (ostensibly) parliamentarians have immunity in many places (and isn’t there a degree of immunity for Parliament-related activity in the UK, which is why whatshisname could superinjunctionbust about the footballer and Trafigura?).

    Not that I am suggesting this fiddling **** was prosecuted maliciously.

    Junkyard
    Free Member

    yes it is abuse of trust iirc and also that they tend to have groomed vulnerable kids..possibly also apply to a taxi driver as well if they were part of the school run or similiar
    FWIW list 99 bans folk from working as teachers for a variety of offences including breach of trust and cheating in exams. Sexual offeces do not lead to an automatic entry on it but a judge can effectively order it. iirc the secretary of state decides who goes on and the list contents is a secret

    Lifer
    Free Member

    MPs can lose office, so should Peers. At the end of the day elected second chamber FTMFW.

    epicyclo
    Full Member

    It should be irrelevant because an upper house that is not democratically elected should not exist.

    Torminalis
    Free Member

    At the end of the day a truly proportionally elected second chamber FTMFW

    Fixed.

    Cougar
    Full Member

    The difference between losing your teaching job for being a nonce and losing your peerage for ‘any crime’ (as suggested by the OP) is in the former the conviction would directly affect your ability to do the job.

    A closer reflection might be to occlude from parliament those who have been convicted of a certain subset of crimes. Perhaps the requirement to sit in the House should be revised to allow only those peers without said convictions; we could do something wooly and English like calling it “upstanding character” maybe.

    Personally, I think it’s a stupid system anyway, and the whole idea of peerage is loony. However, I fundamentally don’t agree that personal and professional lives should be intertwined; footballers who get suspended from playing because of extramarital affairs, for example.

    j_me
    Free Member

    Yes. In support of my argument I give you Mark Thatcher.

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