MP Gordon Prentice has called on the government to replace the House of Lords with a small, directly-elected second chamber.

The Pendle Labour back-bencher backed former Tory Prime Minister Edward Heath in calling for a fully democratic complement to the House of Commons. He spoke out after the House of Commons backed the government's legislation to end the right of hereditary peers to sit and vote in the Lords. And although his proposed replacement goes further than government thinking - which involves a part-elected, part-appointed chamber, he has no doubt that Tony Blair's approach of scrapping the hereditary voting rights in advance of a Royal Commission to decide on a new chamber was correct.

Mr Prentice said: "It is a great day for democracy. Who - except the Tories - wants to go into the 21st century with a medieval parliament?

"Some 350 years ago King Charles I was executed and a Commonwealth proclaimed. The House of Lords was also abolished, only to be re-established with the restoration of the monarchy and the accession of Charles II.

"So we've been there and done it. We shouldn't be afraid of change."

Saying that unless hereditary peers votes were scrapped first, they would always block reform of the upper house, Mr Prentice said: "Legitimacy flows from election - not appointment or patronage or birth."

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.