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House of Lords Act 1999

Consolidated Text As Enacted Cited authorities 24 Cited in Related
Vincent
Year1999


House of Lords Act 1999

1999 Chapter 34

An Act to restrict membership of the House of Lords by virtue of a hereditary peerage; to make related provision about disqualifications for voting at elections to, and for membership of, the House of Commons; and for connected purposes.

[11th November 1999]

Be it enacted by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:—

S-1 Exclusion of hereditary peers.

1 Exclusion of hereditary peers.

1. No-one shall be a member of the House of Lords by virtue of a hereditary peerage.

S-2 Exception from section 1.

2 Exception from section 1.

(1) Section 1 shall not apply in relation to anyone excepted from it by or in accordance with Standing Orders of the House.

(2) At any one time 90 people shall be excepted from section 1; but anyone excepted as holder of the office of Earl Marshal, or as performing the office of Lord Great Chamberlain, shall not count towards that limit.

(3) Once excepted from section 1, a person shall continue to be so throughout his life (until an Act of Parliament provides to the contrary).

(4) Standing Orders shall make provision for filling vacancies among the people excepted from section 1; and in any case where—

(a) the vacancy arises on a death occurring after the end of the first Session of the next Parliament after that in which this Act is passed, and

(b) the deceased person was excepted in consequence of an election,

that provision shall require the holding of a by-election.

(5) A person may be excepted from section 1 by or in accordance with Standing Orders made in anticipation of the enactment or commencement of this section.

(6) Any question whether a person is excepted from section 1 shall be decided by the Clerk of the Parliaments, whose certificate shall be conclusive.

S-3 Removal of disqualifications in relation tothe House of Commons.

3 Removal of disqualifications in relation tothe House of Commons.

(1) The holder of a hereditary peerage shall not be disqualified by virtue of that peerage for—

(a) voting at elections to the House of Commons, or

(b) being, or being elected as, a member of that House.

(2) Subsection (1) shall not apply in relation to anyone excepted from section 1 by virtue of section 2.

S-4 Amendments and repeals.

4 Amendments and repeals.

(1) The enactments mentioned in Schedule 1 are amended as specified there.

(2) The enactments mentioned in Schedule 2 are repealed to the extent specified there.

S-5 Commencement and transitional provision.

5 Commencement and transitional provision.

(1) Sections 1 to 4 (including Schedules 1 and 2) shall come into force at the end of the Session of Parliament in which this Act is passed.

(2) Accordingly, any writ of summons issued for the present Parliament in right of a hereditary peerage shall not have effect after that Session unless it has been issued to a person who, at the end of the Session, is excepted from section 1 by virtue of section 2.

(3) The Secretary of State may by order make such transitional provision about the entitlement of holders of hereditary peerages to vote at elections to the House of Commons or the European Parliament as he considers appropriate.

(4) An order under this section—

(a) may modify the effect of any enactment or any provision made under an enactment, and

(b) shall be made by statutory instrument which shall be subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament.

S-6 Interpretation and short title.

6 Interpretation and short title.

(1) In this Act ‘hereditary peerage’ includes the principality of Wales and the earldom of Chester.

(2) This Act may be cited as the House of Lords Act 1999.

S C H E D U L E S

SCHEDULE 1

Amendments

Peerage Act 1963 (c.48)

Peerage Act 1963 (c.48)

SCH-1.1

1. In section 1(2) of the Peerage Act 1963 (disclaimer of certain hereditary peerages) for the words from ‘has’ to the end there shall be substituted the words ‘is excepted from section 1 of the House of Lords Act 1999 by virtue of section 2 of that Act’.

Recess Elections Act 1975 (c.66)

Recess Elections Act 1975 (c.66)

SCH-1.2

2. In section 1 of the Recess Elections Act 1975 (issue of warrants for making out writs to replace members of the House of Commons whose seats have become vacant), in—

(a) subsection (1)(a), and

(b) paragraph (a) of the definition of ‘certificate of vacancy’ in subsection (2),

for the words ‘become a peer’ there shall be substituted the words ‘become disqualified as a peer for membership of the House of Commons’.

SCH-1.3

3. In Schedule 1 to that Act (certificate of vacancy), for the words ‘has become a peer of Parliament’ there shall be substituted the words ‘has become disqualified as a peer for membership of the House of Commons’.

SCHEDULE 2

Repeals

Chapter

Short title

Extent of repeal

1963 c. 48.

The Peerage Act 1963.

In section 1(3), paragraph (b) and the word ‘and’ immediately preceding it.

Section 2.

In section 3, in subsection (1)(b), the words from ‘(including’ to ‘that House)’ and, in subsection (2), the words from ‘and’ to the end of the subsection.

Section 5.

EXPLANATORY NOTES

INTRODUCTION

1. These explanatory notes relate to the House of Lords Act 1999 (c. 34) which received Royal Assent on 11 November 1999. They have been prepared by the Cabinet Office in order to assist the reader in understanding the Act. They do not form part of the Act and have not been endorsed by Parliament.

2. The notes need to be read in conjunction with the Act. They are not, and are not meant to be, a comprehensive description of the Act. So where a section or part of a section does not seem to require any explanation or comment, none is given.

BACKGROUND

3. The House of Lords Act 1999 is the first part of the Government's step-by-step approach to full-scale reform of the House of Lords. A Royal Commission has been set up to consider further, comprehensive reform of the House and is due to report by 31 December 1999. For the transitional House, a new, more independent system for nominating peers will be introduced. The Government's detailed proposals are set out in a White PaperModernising Parliament Reforming the House of Lords , published on 20 January 1999 (Cm 4183).

THE ACT

4. The Act's main purpose is to restrict membership of the House of Lords by virtue of a hereditary peerage. It also removes the existing disqualifications of a hereditary peer, unless he is excepted under section 2 of the Act from the general exclusion from the House of Lords, to vote in elections to the House of Commons and to stand as a candidate for, or be a member of, the House of Commons.

COMMENTARY ON SECTIONS

Section 1: Exclusion of hereditary peers

5. The main provision of the Act restricts membership of the House of Lords by virtue of a hereditary peerage. No present or future holders of a hereditary peerage in the peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland 1, Great Britain or the United Kingdom, or their heirs, have the right to sit and vote in the House of Lords by virtue of that peerage, or to sit and vote in committees of the House, or to speak in the House, or to receive a writ of summons, unless they are excepted from this general exclusion by section 2 of the Act.

6. The exclusion from membership applies to all those who are members of the House by virtue of a hereditary peerage, unless they are excepted from the exclusion under the terms of section 2. The general exclusion covers —

· members of the Royal Family with the right to sit and vote in the House (the Prince of Wales 2, the Duke of Edinburgh, the Duke of York, the Duke of Gloucester, the Duke of Kent and the Earl of Wessex);

· first holders of a hereditary peerage (of whom there were eight at the time of Royal Assent to the Act);

· any holder of a peerage by virtue of acceleration, being the eldest son of a hereditary peer who is sitting by virtue of one of his father's peerages while the father is still alive; and

· any holder of a hereditary peerage by virtue of the termination of a peerage in abeyance (where only female co-heirs survive to inherit the peerage and one is preferred by the Crown against another for the peerage).

1 Peers of Ireland have not been able to sit and vote in the House of Lords since the Irish Free State (Agreement) Act 1922. However, those who were members of the House of Lords at the time of the passing of that Act remained members until their death (see The Petition of the Earl of Antrim and eleven other Irish peers [1967] A.C. p. 691). The House of Lords Act does not change the position of peers of Ireland.

2 Section 6 (1) makes it clear that ‘hereditary peerage’ includes the principality of Wales and the earldom of Chester.

7. The Act deprives excluded hereditary peers of all the privileges of membership of the House of Lords, including the privileges they enjoyed as members of Parliament. Parliamentary privileges cover various matters, many of which relate to the House of Lords as a whole (such as punishing improper conduct within the House itself), but include some that are personal to individual peers. One of the most important personal privileges is that no action can be taken against a peer for what he or she...

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