Australian Peers - Australian Life Peers

Australian Life Peers

Some Australians have been made life peers or peeresses of the United Kingdom. They include:

• Richard Casey (1890–1976) resigned from the Parliament in 1960 in order to accept a life peerage. He became "Baron Casey, of Berwick in the State of Victoria and the Commonwealth of Australia, and of the City of Westminster", and he took his seat in the House of Lords. In 1965 he was made Governor-General of Australia.

• Sir Howard Florey (1898–1968) was made a life peer in 1965 as "Baron Florey, of Adelaide in the State of South Australia and Commonwealth of Australia and of Marston in the County of Oxford". Both Florey and the discoverer of penicillin, Sir Alexander Fleming, were knighted in 1944. Florey's peerage recognised the monumental work he did in making penicillin available in sufficient quantities to save millions of lives in World War II.

• Robert Hall (1901–1988), Australian-born economic adviser to the UK government (1953–61) and a member of Britain's Economic Planning Board (1947–61), was made a life peer in 1969. He took the name "Baron Roberthall, of Silverspear in the State of Queensland and Commonwealth of Australia and of Trenance in the County of Cornwall".

• Trixie Gardner (born 1927), dentist and Conservative politician, was made a life peeress as "Baroness Gardner of Parkes in the State of New South Wales and Commonwealth of Australia, and of Southgate in Greater London", on 19 June 1981. She is the only Australian-born life peeress, and was the last recipient of a peerage with reference to a place in Australia.

• Sir Robert May (born 1936), Chief Scientific Adviser to HM Government, President of the Royal Society, and a Professor at Sydney, Princeton, Oxford, and Imperial College London, was made a life peer in 2001. After his initial preference for "Baron May of Woollahra" failed an objection from the Protocol Office of the Australian Prime Minister's Department, he chose the title "Baron May of Oxford, of Oxford in the County of Oxfordshire".

• Alec Broers, former Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge University, was ennobled in 2004. His title as a life peer is "Baron Broers, of Cambridge in the County of Cambridgeshire"