House of Lords

The House of Lords is the second chamber of the UK Parliament. It works with the House of Commons to: make laws check and challenge the actions of the government, and provide a forum of independent expertise The House of Lords Chamber spends about 60% of its time on legislation; the other 40% is spent on scrutiny – questioning…

The Lords sit four days a week, Monday-Thursday. You are not expected to attend every sitting, although you can if you wish. Regular attendance is expected, perhaps a day a week, for example. You may also choose to join various sub-committees. So joining the Lords is like becoming a non-executive director of a large prestigious…

Members of the House of Lords are often referred to as peers. A male peer has the title of Lord and a female peer is a Baroness. Interestingly, the wife of a Lord can use the title of Lady but the husband of a Baroness gets no title. A tad unfair in these times of…

Q: How many people apply to join the Lords each year? A: That information is not published but we estimate relatively few, around 100.

We make about a dozen applications for the Lords a year on average, so relatively few compared to Queen’s honours (150 on average). Demand is lower for the Lords compared to honours and there are less Peerages given out (estimate around 20 on average compared to over 2000 Queen’s honours a year). Click on the…