Are members of the House of Lords the idlers that The Times asserts them to be? On January 27, at the height of the row over peers being paid for acting as consultants, Alice Thomson wrote an article in The Times claiming that members of the Upper House were idle as well as biddable.

 
“The bill for the Lords has risen dramatically since the majority of the hereditary peers have been ejected, even though the number of days that peers are sitting has fallen from 174 days five years ago to 148” she said.
 
In fact, figures readily available from the House of Lords' official information office show that the House sat for 164 days in the 2007-08, the latest full session, not 148. Since Ms Thomson did not say where she got her figure of 148 from, it is not possible to be sure why this error – she is 11 per cent out – was made. It seems just possible that she made the cardinal error of comparing days sat in a calendar year with those in a session.
 
By chance, 148 is the average (mean) number of days for which the Lords has sat since 2000. Sitting days have ranged from 63 to 206, largely due some sessions being cut off and others extended when general elections are called, so the only remotely fair comparison is between the number of days sat in the latest session and the average per session in past years. That comparison shows that the House in fact sat for 16 more days last year than it does on average.
 
The average figures for the past six decades, calculated from the figures available from the information office, are as follows:
1950s     104 days
1960's     118 days
1970s     128 days
1980s     135 days
1990s     146 days
2000s     148 days
 
The House may be costing more, as Ms Thomson argued. It is also working longer – contrary to what she claimed.