The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is granted by appointment or else by heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster.[2] Officially, the full name of the house is the Right Honourable the Lords Spiritual and Temporal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled.
Unlike the elected House of Commons, members of the House of Lords (excluding 90 hereditary peers elected among themselves and two peers who are ex officio members) are appointed.[3] The membership of the House of Lords is drawn from the peerage and is made up of Lords Spiritual and Lords Temporal. The Lords Spiritual are 26 bishops in the established Church of England.[4] Of the Lords Temporal, the majority are life peers who are appointed by the monarch on the advice of the Prime Minister, or on the advice of the House of Lords Appointments Commission. However, they also include some hereditary peers including four dukes.[5]
Membership was once an entitlement of all hereditary peers, other than those in the peerage of Ireland, but under the House of Lords Act 1999, the right to membership was restricted to 92 hereditary peers.[6] Since 2008, only one of them is female (Countess of Mar); most hereditary peerages can be inherited only by men.[7]
While the House of Commons has a defined number of seats membership, the number of members in the House of Lords is not fixed. The House of Lords is the only upper house of any bicameral parliament in the world to be larger than its lower house.[8]
The House of Lords scrutinises bills that have been approved by the House of Commons.[9] It regularly reviews and amends Bills from the Commons.[10] While it is unable to prevent Bills passing into law, except in certain limited circumstances,[11] it can delay Bills and force the Commons to reconsider their decisions.[12] In this capacity, the House of Lords acts as a check on the House of Commons that is independent from the electoral process.[13][14][15] Bills can be introduced into either the House of Lords or the House of Commons. While members of the Lords may also take on roles as government ministers, high-ranking officials such as cabinet ministers are usually drawn from the Commons. The House of Lords has its own support services, separate from the Commons, including the House of Lords Library.
The Queen's Speech is delivered in the House of Lords during the State Opening of Parliament. In addition to its role as the upper house, until the establishment of the Supreme Court in 2009, the House of Lords, through the Law Lords, acted as the final court of appeal in the United Kingdom judicial system.[16] The House also has a Church of England role, in that Church Measures must be tabled within the House by the Lords Spiritual.
Today's Parliament of the United Kingdom largely descends, in practice, from the Parliament of England, though the Treaty of Union of 1706 and the Acts of Union that ratified the Treaty in 1707 and created a new Parliament of Great Britain to replace the Parliament of England and the Parliament of Scotland. This new parliament was, in effect, the continuation of the Parliament of England with the addition of 45 MPs and 16 Peers to represent Scotland.
The House of Lords developed from the "Great Council" (Magnum Concilium) that advised the King during medieval times.[17] This royal council came to be composed of ecclesiastics, noblemen, and representatives of the counties of England and Wales (afterwards, representatives of the boroughs as well). The first English Parliament is often considered to be the "Model Parliament" (held in 1295), which included archbishops, bishops, abbots, earls, barons, and representatives of the shires and boroughs.
The power of Parliament grew slowly, fluctuating as the strength of the monarchy grew or declined. For example, during much of the reign of Edward II (1307–1327), the nobility was supreme, the Crown weak, and the shire and borough representatives entirely powerless. In 1569, the authority of Parliament was for the first time recognised not simply by custom or royal charter, but by an authoritative statute, passed by Parliament itself.
During the reign of Edward II's successor, Edward III, Parliament clearly separated into two distinct chambers: the House of Commons (consisting of the shire and borough representatives) and the House of Lords (consisting of the bishops, abbots and peers). The authority of Parliament continued to grow, and during the early 15th century both Houses exercised powers to an extent not seen before. The Lords were far more powerful than the Commons because of the great influence of the great landowners and the prelates of the realm.
The power of the nobility declined during the civil wars of the late 15th century, known as the Wars of the Roses. Much of the nobility was killed on the battlefield or executed for participation in the war, and many aristocratic estates were lost to the Crown. Moreover, feudalism was dying, and the feudal armies controlled by the barons became obsolete. Henry VII (1485–1509) clearly established the supremacy of the monarch, symbolised by the "Crown Imperial". The domination of the Sovereign continued to grow during the reigns of the Tudor monarchs in the 16th century. The Crown was at the height of its power during the reign of Henry VIII (1509–1547).
The House of Lords remained more powerful than the House of Commons, but the Lower House continued to grow in influence, reaching a zenith in relation to the House of Lords during the middle 17th century. Conflicts between the King and the Parliament (for the most part, the House of Commons) ultimately led to the English Civil War during the 1640s. In 1649, after the defeat and execution of King Charles I, the Commonwealth of England was declared, but the nation was effectively under the overall control of Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of England, Scotland and Ireland.[18]
The House of Lords was reduced to a largely powerless body, with Cromwell and his supporters in the Commons dominating the Government. On 19 March 1649, the House of Lords was abolished by an Act of Parliament, which declared that "The Commons of England [find] by too long experience that the House of Lords is useless and dangerous to the people of England."[18] The House of Lords did not assemble again until the Convention Parliament met in 1660 and the monarchy was restored. It returned to its former position as the more powerful chamber of Parliament—a position it would occupy until the 19th century.
19th century
The 19th century was marked by several changes to the House of Lords. The House, once a body of only about 50 members, had been greatly enlarged by the liberality of George III and his successors in creating peerages. The individual influence of a Lord of Parliament was thus diminished.
Moreover, the power of the House as a whole decreased, whilst that of the House of Commons grew. Particularly notable in the development of the Lower House's superiority was the Reform Bill of 1832. The electoral system of the House of Commons was far from democratic: property qualifications greatly restricted the size of the electorate, and the boundaries of many constituencies had not been changed for centuries.
Entire cities such as Manchester had not even one representative in the House of Commons, while the 11 voters living in Old Sarum retained their ancient right to elect two MPs. A small borough was susceptible to bribery, and was often under the control of a patron, whose nominee was guaranteed to win an election. Some aristocrats were patrons of numerous "pocket boroughs", and therefore controlled a considerable part of the membership of the House of Commons.
When the House of Commons passed a Reform Bill to correct some of these anomalies in 1831, the House of Lords rejected the proposal. The popular cause of reform, however, was not abandoned by the ministry, despite a second rejection of the bill in 1832. Prime Minister Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey advised the King to overwhelm opposition to the bill in the House of Lords by creating about 80 new pro-Reform peers. William IV originally balked at the proposal, which effectively threatened the opposition of the House of Lords, but at length relented.
Before the new peers were created, however, the Lords who opposed the bill admitted defeat and abstained from the vote, allowing the passage of the bill. The crisis damaged the political influence of the House of Lords but did not altogether end it. A vital reform was effected by the Lords themselves in 1868, when they changed their standing orders to abolish proxy voting, preventing Lords from voting without taking the trouble to attend.[19] Over the course of the century the power of the Upper House were further reduced stepwise, culminating in the 20th century with the Parliament Act of 1911. Then the Commons gradually became the stronger House of Parliament.
The status of the House of Lords returned to the forefront of debate after the election of a Liberal Government in 1906. In 1909, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, David Lloyd George, introduced into the House of Commons the "People's Budget", which proposed a land tax targeting wealthy landowners. The popular measure, however, was defeated in the heavily Conservative House of Lords.[20]
Having made the powers of the House of Lords a primary campaign issue, the Liberals were narrowly re-elected in January 1910. Prime Minister H. H. Asquith then proposed that the powers of the House of Lords be severely curtailed. After a further general election in December 1910, and with an undertaking by King George V to create sufficient new Liberal peers to overcome Lords' opposition to the measure if necessary, the Asquith Government secured the passage of a bill to curtail the powers of the House of Lords.
The Parliament Act 1911 effectively abolished the power of the House of Lords to reject legislation, or to amend it in a way unacceptable to the House of Commons: most bills could be delayed for no more than three parliamentary sessions or two calendar years. It was not meant to be a permanent solution; more comprehensive reforms were planned. Neither party, however, pursued the matter with much enthusiasm, and the House of Lords remained primarily hereditary. In 1949, the Parliament Act reduced the delaying power of the House of Lords further to two sessions or one year.
In 1958, the predominantly hereditary nature of the House of Lords was changed by the Life Peerages Act 1958, which authorised the creation of life baronies, with no numerical limits. The number of Life Peers then gradually increased, though not at a constant rate.
The Labour Party had for most of the 20th century a commitment, based on the party's historic opposition to class privilege, to abolish the House of Lords, or at least expel the hereditary element. In 1968, the Labour Government of Harold Wilson attempted to reform the House of Lords by introducing a system under which hereditary peers would be allowed to remain in the House and take part in debate, but would be unable to vote. This plan, however, was defeated in the House of Commons by a coalition of traditionalist Conservatives (such as Enoch Powell), and Labour members who continued to advocate the outright abolition of the Upper House (such as Michael Foot).
When Michael Foot became leader of the Labour Party in 1980, abolition of the House of Lords became a part of the party's agenda; under his successor, Neil Kinnock, however, a reformed Upper House was proposed instead. In the meantime, the creation of hereditary peerages (except for members of the Royal Family) has been arrested, with the exception of three creations during the administration of the Conservative Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s.
Whilst some hereditary peers were at best apathetic, the Labour Party's clear commitments were not lost on Merlin Hanbury-Tracy, 7th Baron Sudeley, who for decades was considered an expert on the House of Lords. In December 1979 the Conservative Monday Club published his extensive paper entitled Lords Reform – Why tamper with the House of Lords? and in July 1980 The Monarchist carried another article by Sudeley entitled Why Reform or Abolish the House of Lords?.[21] In 1990 he wrote a further booklet for the Monday Club entitled The Preservation of the House of Lords.
In 2019 a seven month enquiry by Naomi Ellenbogen QC found that one in five staff of the house had experienced bullying or harassment which they did not report for fear of reprisals.[22] This was proceeded by several cases including Liberal Democrat Lord Lester of lords who used their position to sexually harass or abuse women.[23][24]
Lords reform
Main article: Reform of the House of Lords
First admission of women
There were no women sitting in the House of Lords until 1958, when a small number came into the chamber as a result of the Life Peerages Act 1958. One of these was Irene Curzon, 2nd Baroness Ravensdale, who had inherited her father's peerage in 1925 and was made a life peer to enable her to sit. After a campaign stretching back in some cases to the 1920s, another twelve women who held hereditary peerages in their own right were admitted by the Peerage Act 1963.
1997–2010
The Labour Party included in its 1997 general election Manifesto a commitment to remove the hereditary peerage from the House of Lords.[25] Their subsequent election victory in 1997 under Tony Blair led to the denouement of the traditional House of Lords. The Labour Government introduced legislation to expel all hereditary peers from the Upper House as a first step in Lords reform. As a part of a compromise, however, it agreed to permit 92 hereditary peers to remain until the reforms were complete. Thus all but 92 hereditary peers were expelled under the House of Lords Act 1999 (see below for its provisions), making the House of Lords predominantly an appointed house.
Since 1999, however, no further reform has taken place. The Wakeham Commission proposed introducing a 20% elected element to the Lords, but this plan was widely criticised.[26] A parliamentary Joint Committee was established in 2001 to resolve the issue, but it reached no conclusion and instead gave Parliament seven options to choose from (fully appointed, 20% elected, 40% elected, 50% elected, 60% elected, 80%, and fully elected). In a confusing series of votes in February 2003, all of these options were defeated, although the 80% elected option fell by just three votes in the Commons. Socialist MPs favouring outright abolition voted against all the options.[citation needed]
In 2005, a cross-party group of senior MPs (Kenneth Clarke, Paul Tyler, Tony Wright, George Young and Robin Cook) published a report proposing that 70% of members of the House of Lords should be elected — each member for a single long term — by the single transferable vote system. Most of the remainder were to be appointed by a Commission to ensure a mix of "skills, knowledge and experience". This proposal was also not implemented. A cross-party campaign initiative called "Elect the Lords" was set up to make the case for a predominantly elected Second Chamber in the run up to the 2005 general election.
At the 2005 election, the Labour Party proposed further reform of the Lords, but without specific details.[27] The Conservative Party, which had, prior to 1997, opposed any tampering with the House of Lords[citation needed], favoured an 80% elected Second Chamber, while the Liberal Democrats called for a fully elected Senate. During 2006, a cross-party committee discussed Lords reform, with the aim of reaching a consensus: its findings were published in early 2007.[28]
On 7 March 2007, members of the House of Commons voted ten times on a variety of alternative compositions for the upper chamber.[29] Outright abolition, a wholly appointed house, a 20% elected house, a 40% elected house, a 50% elected house and a 60% elected house were all defeated in turn. Finally the vote for an 80% elected chamber was won by 305 votes to 267, and the vote for a wholly elected chamber was won by an even greater margin: 337 to 224. Significantly this last vote represented an overall majority of MPs.[30]
Furthermore, examination of the names of MPs voting at each division shows that, of the 305 who voted for the 80% elected option, 211 went on to vote for the 100% elected option. Given that this vote took place after the vote on 80% – whose result was already known when the vote on 100% took place – this showed a clear preference for a fully elected upper house among those who voted for the only other option that passed. But this was nevertheless only an indicative vote and many political and legislative hurdles remained to be overcome for supporters of an elected second chamber. The House of Lords, soon after, rejected this proposal and voted for an entirely appointed House of Lords.[31]
In July 2008, Jack Straw, the Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor, introduced a white paper to the House of Commons proposing to replace the House of Lords with an 80–100% elected chamber, with one third being elected at each general election, for a term of approximately 12–15 years.[32] The white paper states that as the peerage would be totally separated from membership of the upper house, the name "House of Lords" would no longer be appropriate: It goes on to explain that there is cross-party consensus for the new chamber to be titled the "Senate of the United Kingdom"; however, to ensure the debate remains on the role of the upper house rather than its title, the white paper is neutral on the title of the new house.
On 30 November 2009, a Code of Conduct for Members of the House of Lords was agreed by them; certain amendments were agreed by them on 30 March 2010 and on 12 June 2014.[33] The scandal over expenses in the Commons was at its highest pitch only six months before, and the Labourite leadership under Baroness Royall of Blaisdon determined that something sympathetic should be done.[citation needed]
In Meg Russell's article "Is the House of Lords already reformed?", she states three essential features of a legitimate House of Lords.[34] The first is that it must have adequate powers over legislation to make the government think twice before making a decision. The House of Lords, she argues, currently has enough power to make it relevant. During Tony Blair's first year, he was defeated 38 times in the Lords. Secondly, as to the composition of the Lords, Meg Russell suggests that the composition must be distinct from the Commons, otherwise it would render the Lords useless. The third feature is the perceived legitimacy of the Lords. She writes, "In general legitimacy comes with election."[34]
If the Lords have a distinct and elected composition, this would probably come about through fixed term proportional representation. If this happens, then the perceived legitimacy of the Lords could arguably outweigh the legitimacy of the Commons. This would especially be the case if the House of Lords had been elected more recently than the House of Commons as it could be said to reflect the will of the people better than the Commons.[citation needed]
In this scenario, there may well come a time when the Lords twice reject a Bill from the Commons and it is forced through. This would in turn trigger questions about the amount of power the Lords should have and there would be pressure for it to increase. This hypothetical process is known as the "circumnavigation of power theory". It implies that it would never be in any government's interest to legitimise the Lords, as they would be forfeiting their own power.[citation needed]
2010–present
The Conservative–Liberal Democrat coalition agreed, after the 2010 general election, to outline clearly a provision for a wholly or mainly elected second chamber, elected by proportional representation. These proposals sparked a debate on 29 June 2010. As an interim measure, appointment of new peers would reflect the shares of the vote secured by the political parties in the last general election.
Detailed proposals for Lords reform, including a draft House of Lords Reform Bill, were published on 17 May 2011. These included a 300-member hybrid house, of whom 80% would be elected. A further 20% would be appointed, and reserve space would be included for some Church of England bishops. Under the proposals, members would also serve single non-renewable terms of 15 years. Former MPs would be allowed to stand for election to the Upper House, but members of the Upper House would not be immediately allowed to become MPs.
The details of the proposal were:[35]
The upper chamber shall continue to be known as the House of Lords for legislative purposes.
The reformed House of Lords should have 300 members of whom 240 are "Elected Members" and 60 appointed "Independent Members". Up to 12 Church of England bishops may sit in the house as ex officio "Lords Spiritual".
Elected Members will serve a single, non-renewable term of 15 years.
Elections to the reformed Lords should take place at the same time as elections to the House of Commons.
Elected Members should be elected using the Single Transferable Vote system of proportional representation.
Twenty Independent Members (a third) shall take their seats within the reformed house at the same time as elected members do so, and for the same 15-year term.
Independent Members will be appointed by the Queen after being proposed by the Prime Minister acting on advice of an Appointments Commission.
There will no longer be a link between the peerage system and membership of the upper house.
The current powers of the House of Lords would not change and the House of Commons shall retain its status as the primary House of Parliament.
The proposals were considered by a Joint Committee on House of Lords Reform made up of both MPs and Peers, which issued its final report on 23 April 2012, making the following suggestions:[citation needed]
The reformed House of Lords should have 450 members.
Party groupings, including the Crossbenchers, should choose which of their members are retained in the transition period, with the percentage of members allotted to each group based on their share of the peers with high attendance during a given period.
Up to 12 Lords Spiritual should be retained in a reformed House of Lords.
Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg introduced the House of Lords Reform Bill 2012 on 27 June 2012[36] which built on proposals published on 17 May 2011.[37] However, this Bill was abandoned[38] by the Government on 6 August 2012 following opposition from within the Conservative Party.
House of Lords Reform Act 2014
A private members bill to introduce some reforms was introduced by Dan Byles in 2013.[39] The House of Lords Reform Act 2014 received the Royal Assent in 2014.[40] Under the new law:
All peers can retire or resign from the chamber (prior to this only hereditary peers could disclaim their peerages).
Peers can be disqualified for non-attendance.
Peers can be removed for receiving prison sentences of a year or more.[40]
House of Lords (Expulsion and Suspension) Act 2015
The House of Lords (Expulsion and Suspension) Act 2015 authorised the House to expel or suspend members.
Lords Spiritual (Women) Act 2015
Main article: Lords Spiritual (Women) Act 2015
See also: Women in the House of Lords
This act makes provision to preferentially admit bishops of the Church of England who are women to the Lords Spiritual in the 10 years following its commencement.
In 2015, Rachel Treweek, Bishop of Gloucester, became the first woman to sit as a Lord Spiritual in the House of Lords.[41] As of 2019, five women bishops sit as Lords Spirituals, four of them due to this act.
Overcrowding
The size of the House of Lords has varied greatly throughout its history. The English House of Lords - then comprising 168 members - was joined at Westminster by 16 Scottish peers to represent the peerage of Scotland - a total of 184 nobles - in 1707's first Parliament of Great Britain. A further 28 Irish members to represent the peerage of Ireland were added in 1801 to the first Parliament of the United Kingdom. From about 220 peers in the eighteenth century,[42] the house saw continued expansion; with the increasing numbers of life peers after the Life Peerages Act 1958 and the inclusion of all Scottish peers and the first female peers in the Peerage Act 1963, it increased to a record size of 1,330 in October 1999, before Lords reform reduced it to 669, mostly life peers, by March 2000.[43] The chamber's membership again expanded in the following decades, increasing to above eight hundred active members in 2014 and prompting further reforms in the House of Lords Reform Act that year. A cap of 600 members was subsequently proposed by the Lords, though the current figure is 782.
In April 2011, a cross-party group of former leading politicians, including many senior members of the House of Lords, called on the Prime Minister David Cameron to stop creating new peers. He had created 117 new peers since becoming prime minister in May 2010, a faster rate of elevation than any PM in British history. The expansion occurred while his government had tried (in vain) to reduce the size of the House of Commons by 50 members, from 650 to 600.[44]
In August 2014, despite there being a seating capacity of only around 230[45] to 400[46] on the benches in the Lords chamber, the House had 774 active members (plus 54 who were not entitled to attend or vote, having been suspended or granted leave of absence). This made the House of Lords the largest parliamentary chamber in any democracy.[46] In August 2014, former Speaker of the House of Commons Baroness Betty Boothroyd requested that "older peers should retire gracefully" to ease the overcrowding in the House of Lords. She also criticised successive prime ministers for filling the second chamber with "lobby fodder" in an attempt to help their policies become law. She made her remarks days before a new batch of peers were due to be created and several months after the passage of the House of Lords Reform Act 2014 which enabled peers to retire or resign their seats in the House, which had previously been impossible.[47][48]
In August 2015, following the creation of a further 45 peers in the Dissolution Honours, the total number of eligible members of the Lords increased to 826. In a report entitled Does size matter? the BBC said: "Increasingly, yes. Critics argue the House of Lords is the second largest legislature after the Chinese National People's Congress and dwarfs Upper Houses in other bicameral democracies such as the United States (100 senators), France (348 senators), Australia (76 senators), Canada (105 appointed senators) and India (250 members). The Lords is also larger than the Supreme People's Assembly of North Korea (687 members). [...] Peers grumble that there is not enough room to accommodate all of their colleagues in the Chamber, where there are only about 400 seats, and say they are constantly jostling for space – particularly during high-profile sittings", but added, "On the other hand, defenders of the Lords say that it does a vital job scrutinising legislation, a lot of which has come its way from the Commons in recent years".[49] In late 2016, a Lord Speaker's committee formed to examine the issue of overcrowding, with fears membership could swell to above 1,000, and in October 2017 the committee presented its findings. In December 2017, the Lords debated and broadly approved its report, which proposed a cap on membership at 600 peers, with a fifteen-year term limit for new peers and a "two-out, one-in" limit on new appointments. By October 2018, the Lord Speaker's committee commended the reduction in peers' numbers, noting that the rate of departures had been greater than expected, with the House of Commons's Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Select Committee approving the progress achieved without legislation.[50] By April 2019, with the retirement of nearly one hundred peers since the passage of the House of Lords Reform Act 2014, the number of active peers had been reduced to a total of 782, of whom 665 were life peers.[51][52] This total however, remains greater than the membership of 669 peers in March 2000, after implementation of the House of Lords Act 1999 removed the bulk of the hereditary peers from their seats, remains well above the 600-member cap, and is still larger than the House of Commons's 650 members.
