One of Sir Keir Starmer’s top allies has hailed the axing of hereditary peers as “the biggest step in Lords reform for a long time”.
Cabinet Office minister Pat McFadden stressed that MPs had backed the move and it was now down to peers to agree to it.
They voted 435 to 73 to pass the third reading of the Bill that would remove the 92 seats reserved for peers who are there by right of birth.
The Bill to remove hereditary peers passed its third reading with a huge majority in the House of Commons last night. Now moves to House of Lords to consider.
— Pat McFadden (@patmcfaddenmp) November 13, 2024
If it becomes law it will be the biggest step in Lords reform for a long time. https://t.co/GV0ZAXEdxM
Mr McFadden tweeted: “The Bill to remove hereditary peers passed its third reading with a huge majority in the House of Commons last night.
“Now moves to House of Lords to consider.
“If it becomes law it will be the biggest step in Lords reform for a long time.”
However, the House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill faces a potentially difficult journey through the Upper Chamber.
Conservative shadow leader of the Lords Lord True has branded it “partisan”.
He warned earlier this week: “The execution will have to be done at close quarters, brushing shoulders in the lobbies as we go to vote for the removal of much-respected colleagues.”
He conjured the image of peers seeking to “avoid sitting next to a colleague we have just voted to expel”.
The bill, which delivers on a promise in Labour’s election manifesto, has been promoted as the first step in a process of reform.
However, another commitment, a mandatory retirement age of 80 in the Lords, was not included in the Government’s legislative plans.
House Of Cards author and Conservative peer Lord Dobbs argued for wider reform, rather than a “rushed standalone Bill”.
He said: “Our hereditary colleagues should be allowed to leave with their heads held high, not stuck on the end of a pike.
“When Brutus discussed doing away with Julius Caesar he knew it had to be done with a sense of justice: ‘Let’s carve him as a dish fit for the gods, not hew him as a carcass fit for hounds’.”
But Labour peer Lord Grocott, a former MP who had long campaigned to scrap hereditary peer by-elections, argued the way to reform was not “one grandiose scheme”.
He said: “The overwhelming evidence of the last 100 years is that attempt at wholesale reform all in one go will slowly and inexorably grind into the sand.
“The reforms which will succeed are those which are short, simple and focused.”
