Sir Keir Starmer is in favour of abolishing the House of Lords and replacing it with an elected Assembly of the Nations and Regions, but that will not happen before the next election.
Labour’s election manifesto , externalcalled House of Lords reform “long overdue” and “essential” as the chamber is too large and many peers fail to serve democracy.
Several attempts have been made to change the upper chamber over the years, but reforming the House of Lords is notoriously difficult as peers themselves must approve any changes.
Sir Tony Blair’s Labour government reached a deal with the Tories to massively reduce the number of hereditary peers from around 800 to the current 92.
During the coalition government, an attempt by the Liberal Democrats to replace the House of Lords with an elected chamber collapsed after talks with Conservative rebels failed.
About half of hereditary peers still in the chamber are Conservatives, with the rest mainly independent crossbenchers, and a small number of Labour and Liberal Democrat peers.
On the Conservative benches is Lord Attlee – grandson of Labour Prime Minister Clement Attlee.
Viscount Stansgate, whose father Tony Benn renounced his peerage to sit in the Commons, is one of four Labour hereditary peers.
The Duke of Wellington, whose great-great-great-grandfather defeated Napoleon at Waterloo in 1815, and Lord Ravensdale, the great-grandson of Oswald Mosley who founded the British Union of Fascists in 1932, both sit as crossbench peers.
The Earl Marshal and Lord Great Chamberlain had been expected to keep their seats due to ceremonial functions in state occasions, but will also be removed under the plans.
Most Lords are entitled to a £342 daily allowance for each sitting day they attend – although they can choose not to claim it.
Some receive a salary instead, including the Lord Speaker who receives £106,363.
Government ministers in the Lords are entitled to ministerial salary, external, which ranges from £66,884 to £106,363, although the actual amount claimed is slightly below these figures.
