KEIR Starmer is reportedly planning to stuff the House of Lords with new Labour peers in a bid to drive his agenda through the upper chamber.
Dozens of new peerages will be created, despite Labour previously promising to abolish the unelected chamber, including a new job-for-life for Starmer’s outgoing policy chief Liz Lloyd, according to The Guardian.
Lloyd was removed from No 10 in a reshuffle of the Prime Minister’s top team, which is being seen as an attempt to draw power away from embattled Chancellor Rachel Reeves.
Plans to create new Labour peers are aimed at preventing the Tories, who dominate the Lords, from holding up Government legislation – such as the policy of abolishing the last remaining hereditary peerages.
Insiders told The Guardian that a new list of peerages could come as soon as October.
The Tories currently have 285 peers, compared with Labour’s 209. Once the 44 Tory hereditary peers are removed, the Conservatives will still have around 30 more members in the upper chamber than the Government.
Labour ditched their policy to abolish the House of Lords in early 2024 though they claim it remains a long-term aim.
It was replaced with a watered-down pledge to abolish the remaining hereditary peerages in the upper house.
However, the Church of England will continue to have automatic representation in the Lords, which makes Britain one of the few countries in the world to automatically grant parliamentary seats to clerics.
Polling has previously suggested that Britons are in favour of getting rid of the unelected second chamber, the abolition of which has ostensibly been Labour policy for more than 100 years.
A survey carried out last year showed that only 13% of people would be opposed to getting rid of the Lords, with 59% of people in favour. That figure rises to an overwhelming majority among Labour voters at 72% of people who backed the party in 2019.
