The Life Peerages Act 1958 established the modern standards for the creation of life peers by the monarch of the United Kingdom. Life peers are barons and are members of the House of Lords for life, but their titles and membership in the Lords are not inherited by their children. Judicial life peers already sat in the House under the terms of the Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876. The Life Peerages Act vastly increased the ability of the Prime Minister to change the composition of the House of Lords and considerably lessened the dominance of hereditary peers.
The Act allowed for the creation of female peers entitled to sit in the House of Lords; the first such women peers took their seats 21 October 1958.
A life peer is created by the Queen by Letters Patent under the Great Seal on the advice of the Prime Minister.
Before the Act was passed, former Prime Ministers were usually created Viscounts or Earls (which are hereditary peerages) in gratitude for their public service in high office. The last Prime Minister and the last person to be made an Earl was Harold Macmillan under the Thatcher government in the 1980s.
Famous quotes containing the words life and/or act:
“A book is a part of life, a manifestation of life, just as much as a tree or a horse or a star. It obeys its own rhythms, its own laws, whether it be a novel, a play, or a diary. The deep, hidden rhythm of life is always there—that of the pulse, the heart beat.”
—Henry Miller (1891–1980)
“I’ve always thought a hotel ought to offer optional small animals.... I mean a cat to sleep on your bed at night, or a dog of some kind to act pleased when you come in. You ever notice how a hotel room feels so lifeless?”
—Anne Tyler (b. 1941)