Parliament of the United Kingdom |
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| Long title | An Act to make provision for the creation of life peerages carrying the right to sit and vote in the House of Lords. |
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| Statute book chapter | 6 & 7 Eliz. 2 c. 21 |
| Dates | |
| Royal Assent | 30 April 1958 |
| Status: | |
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 "part-time" 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.[1]
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.
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