Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The law applicable to a British hereditary peerage depends on which Kingdom it belongs to. Peerages of England, Great Britain, and the United Kingdom follow English law; the difference between them is that peerages of England were created before the Act of Union 1707, peerages of Great Britain between 1707 and the Union with Ireland in 1800, and peerages of the United Kingdom since 1800.
Similarly, Lord Reed was created a life peer in 2019 when he was appointed President of the Supreme Court, [9] all of his predecessors in that role having already been created life peers as former Lords of Appeal in Ordinary. Life peerages may in certain cases be awarded to hereditary peers.
The first women in the House of Lords took their seats in 1958, forty years after women were granted the right to stand as MPs in the House of Commons. These were life peeresses appointed by the Prime Minister, although countesses had appeared in medieval times. Female hereditary peers were able to sit in the
Prior to the Life Peerages Act 1958, membership in the House of Lords was strictly male and overwhelmingly based on possession of a hereditary title. There existed a few exceptions to the hereditary principle, such as for the Lords Spiritual. The Act made it possible for life peers of both sexes to be members of the Lords.
The automatic right of hereditary peers to sit in the House of Lords was abolished in 1999, but life peers are unaffected. Some privileges have been granted to individual lords, but they too had been abolished by the end of the 20th century. Peers also have several other rights not formally part of the privilege of peerage.
The Act also granted suo jure hereditary women peers (other than those in the Peerage of Ireland) the right to sit in the House of Lords, which introduced twelve new women to the House. This was not the first time that women were members of the House of Lords; the Life Peerages Act 1958 allowed all life peers (men and women) to sit in the House.
Life peerages themselves were not unprecedented, though it was unclear whether or not life peers were by virtue of their titles entitled to sit in the House of Lords. In most cases, the peerages were granted to women, but they were not eligible for a seat in the House of Lords; there was no example of a male sitting in the House by virtue of a ...
The Life Peerages Act passed that year permitted the creation of life baronies for both men and women on a regular basis. Hereditary peeresses were admitted in 1963 under the Peerage Act. The Peerage Act also permitted peers to disclaim hereditary peerages within a year of succeeding to them, or within a year of attaining the age of majority.