Viscount Cranborne: "I had to resign or make sure the plan got through"

In his first interview since being fired by Conservative leader William Hague for negotiating a secret deal to save a small number of hereditary peers during Lords reform, Lord Cranborne said he would do it again.

He said Mr Hague had known of his talks with the government and approved of their likely outcome.

Viscount Cranborne: "Hague showed authority by sacking me"

"He knew very well until the last 10 days these negotiations were going on," Lord Cranborne told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

"He approved them - to begin with he rather did like this deal.

"The committee of the shadow cabinet turned it down. I knew that peers overwhelmingly would have been delighted and surprised by this transitional phase.

"It wasn't a practical proposition for me to do what the shadow cabinet wanted me to do so I either had to resign or I had to make sure the plan got through."

Lord Cranborne defended himself against the charge he had seriously undermined Mr Hague's leadership.

"He showed a great deal of authority by sacking me," he said.

He insisted his tactics had not merely been intended to allow a few hereditary peers to cling on to power for a short while longer.

"What we had to do was not preserve the hereditaries for another 18 months, but to try and put a little bit of grit in the government's plans so it would be impossible for them to stick on a stage one House."

This would make sure the Royal Commission led by Lord Wakeham examining stage two of Lords reform - what will effectively replace the existing chamber - carries out a "full and proper investigation".

Lord Cranborne spoke the day after peers inflicted a technical defeat on the government's Lords reform White Paper.

Baroness Jay: Warning Tories to co-operate

Labour Lords abstained on an opposition amendment calling for the independence and powers of Parliament to be increased and any significant cut in the powers of the Lords to be rejected.

Lords Leader Baroness Jay had dismissed the amendment as "unnecessary" and appeared to warn wrecking tactics could scupper chances of the government signing up to the deal.

She told peers: "We would genuinely prefer to proceed to reform by consensus. But we can only try to build that consensus if we know the basis for discussion, for negotiation and - hopefully - agreement in the future."

But Lord Cranborne rejected the suggestion that Tony Blair expected Tory peers to accept reform without protest.

"One of the last things I said to the prime minister when he rang me up on my sacking is, 'We look forward to giving you as much trouble in the new session as the last' and he laughed.