Liberal Democrats call for quick Lords elections and refer four peers to police

1.43.00pm GMT Sun 1st Feb 2009

The Liberal Democrats today called for the House of Lords to be elected at the same time as the next general election, as they referred four more peers to the police over newspaper allegations that they had accepted “cash for amendments”.

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne said:

"The way in which the House of Lords has been brought into disrepute by allegations of cash for amendments makes an elected chamber urgent. Voters must be able to hold lawmakers to account.

"With a light parliamentary agenda this year, we should legislate now and elect the Lords for the first time at the general election"

Commenting on referring four more peers to the police over allegations of "cash for amendments", Chris Huhne said:

"I will write tomorrow to Sir Paul Stephenson asking the police to investigate, in co-operation with the Crown Prosecution Service, whether Lord O'Neill, Lord Berkeley, Baroness Valentine and Baroness Coussins have contravened the common law offence of bribery.

"These extra four peers appear to be in the same category where, if press allegations are correct, they respectively tabled amendments serving the interests of organisations paying them such as the Specialist Engineering Contractors' Group, Rail Freight Group, London First and a US drinks company."