Number of Life Peers
| Prime Minister | Party | Tenure | Peers | Per year |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Harold Macmillan | Conservative | 1957–1963 | 48 | 9.6* |
| Alec Douglas-Home | Conservative | 1963–1964 | 14 | 14.0 |
| Harold Wilson | Labour | 1964–1970 | 123 | 20.5** |
| Edward Heath | Conservative | 1970–1974 | 56 | 14.0 |
| Harold Wilson | Labour | 1974–1976 | 80 | 40.0** |
| James Callaghan | Labour | 1976–1979 | 57 | 19.0 |
| Margaret Thatcher | Conservative | 1979–1990 | 200 | 18.2 |
| John Major | Conservative | 1990–1997 | 141 | 20.1 |
| Tony Blair | Labour | 1997–2007 | 357 | 35.7 |
| Gordon Brown | Labour | 2007–2010 | 34 | 11.3 |
| David Cameron | Conservative | 2010- | 121 | 60.5 |
| Total | 1,231 | 20.2 | ||
| * ** |
||||
The Appellate Jurisdiction Act originally provided for the appointment of two Lords of Appeal in Ordinary, who would continue to serve while holding judicial office, though in 1887, they were permitted to continue to sit in the House of Lords for life, under the style and dignity of baron. The number of Lords of Appeal in Ordinary was increased from time to time — to three in 1882, to four in 1891, to six in 1913, to seven in 1919, to nine in 1947, to 11 in 1968 and to 12 in 1994. These provisions were repealed by the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 which created the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom.
The rate of creation of life peerages under the Life Peerages Act has not shown a consistent pattern. Current prime minister David Cameron has been creating life peerages at the highest rate. Conservative Prime Ministers have created on average 20 life peers per year in office, Labour Prime Ministers an average of 27.2 per year. In absolute terms, Labour (in 24 years) created 1.2 times the number of life peerages created by the Conservatives (in 29 years). - On the other hand, Conservative Prime Ministers (especially Macmillan) created the vast majority of the about 50 hereditary peerages still created since 1958.
In 1999, there were 172 Conservative and 160 Labour life peers in the House of Lords, and by 4 January 2010, there were 141 Conservative and 207 Labour life peers in the House of Lords. The hereditary element of the House of Lords, however, was much less balanced. In 1999, for example, immediately before most hereditary peers were removed by the House of Lords Act, there were 350 Conservative hereditary peers, compared with 19 Labour peers and 23 Liberal Democrat peers.
Read more about this topic: Life Peer (United Kingdom)
Famous quotes containing the words number of, number, life and/or peers:
“The world is so full of a number of things,
I’m sure we should all be as happy as kings.”
—Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–1894)
“In many ways, life becomes simpler [for young adults]. . . . We are expected to solve only a finite number of problems within a limited range of possible solutions. . . . It’s a mental vacation compared with figuring out who we are, what we believe, what we’re going to do with our talents, how we’re going to solve the social problems of the globe . . .and what the perfect way to raise our children will be.”
—Roger Gould (20th century)
“The child thinks of growing old as an almost obscene calamity, which for some mysterious reason will never happen to itself. All who have passed the age of thirty are joyless grotesques, endlessly fussing about things of no importance and staying alive without, so far as the child can see, having anything to live for. Only child life is real life.”
—George Orwell (1903–1950)
“The poet will write for his peers alone. He will remember only that he saw truth and beauty from his position, and expect the time when a vision as broad shall overlook the same field as freely.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)