House of Lords

House of Lords
Logo of the House of Lords
Type
Type
Leadership
Lord Speaker
The Lord McFall of Alcluith
since 1 May 2021
Senior Deputy Speaker
The Lord Gardiner of Kimble
since 11 May 2021
Leader of the House
The Baroness Smith of Basildon, Labour
since 5 July 2024
Shadow Leader of the House
The Lord True, Conservative
since 8 July 2024
Government Chief Whip
The Lord Kennedy of Southwark, Labour
since 10 July 2024
Structure
SeatsNot fixed (currently 827[c][1])
Political groups
Lords Spiritual
  •   Bishops (24)[a]
Lords Temporal
HM Government
HM Most Loyal Opposition
Other groups
Crossbench
  •   Crossbenchers (180)
Presiding officer
  •   Lord Speaker (1)
Length of term
  • Lords Temporal: for life
  • Lords Spiritual: for tenure as a diocesan bishop
SalaryNo annual salary, but tax-free daily allowance and expenses paid.
Meeting place
House of Lords Chamber
Palace of Westminster, London
51°29′55.7″N 0°07′29.5″W / 51.498806°N 0.124861°W / 51.498806; -0.124861
Website
www.parliament.uk/business/lords
Footnotes
  1. ^ The Lords Spiritual sit on the Government benches and are so depicted in the diagram above.
  2. ^ Including 15 Labour and Co-operative peers
  3. ^ This figure (correct as of 12 September 2025) excludes 24 peers who are on leave of absence or otherwise disqualified or suspended from sitting.

The House of Lords[a] is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom.[5] Like the lower house, the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England.[6] One of the oldest extant institutions in the world, its origins lie in the early 11th century and the emergence of bicameralism in the 13th century.[7][8][9]

In contrast to the House of Commons, membership of the Lords is not generally acquired by election. Most members are appointed for life, on either a political or non-political basis.[10][11] Hereditary membership was limited in 1999 to 92 excepted hereditary peers: 90 elected through internal by-elections, plus the Earl Marshal and Lord Great Chamberlain as members ex officio, the sole two officers to directly inherit their seats. The House of Lords also includes up to 26 archbishops and bishops of the Church of England, known as Lords Spiritual.[11][12] Since 2014, membership may be voluntarily relinquished or terminated upon expulsion.[11]

As the upper house of Parliament, the House of Lords has many similar functions to the House of Commons.[13] It scrutinises legislation, holds the government to account, and considers and reports upon public policy.[14] Peers may also seek to introduce legislation or propose amendments to bills.[14] While it is unable to prevent bills passing into law, except in certain limited circumstances, it may delay the enactment of bills for up to one year.[15][16] In this capacity, as a body independent from the pressures of the political process, the House of Lords is said to act as a "revising chamber" focusing on legislative detail, while occasionally asking the House of Commons to reconsider its plans.[17][18]

While peers may also serve as government ministers, they are typically only selected to serve as junior ministers, except for the Leader of the House of Lords.[19] The House of Lords does not control the term of the prime minister or of the government;[20] only the Commons may vote to require the prime minister to resign or call an election.[21] Unlike the House of Commons, which has a defined number of seats, the number of members in the House of Lords is not fixed. As of 12 September 2025, it has 827 sitting members.

The King's Speech is delivered in the House of Lords chamber during the State Opening of Parliament. In addition to its role as the upper house, the House of Lords, through the Law Lords, acted as the final court of appeal in the United Kingdom judicial system until the establishment of the Supreme Court in 2009.[22]

The House of Lords is the only upper house of any bicameral parliament in the world to be larger than its lower house.[23] It is the second-largest legislative chamber in the world, behind the National People's Congress of China.[24]

The House of Lords also has a Church of England role, in that Church Measures must be tabled within the House by the Lords Spiritual. The United Kingdom is one of only two countries in the world to award religious figures a permanent seat in the legislature, the other being Iran.[25]

  1. ^ "Lords by party, type of peerage and gender". Parliament of the United Kingdom.
  2. ^ "Public petitions to the House of Lords – Erskine May – UK Parliament". erskinemay.parliament.uk. Archived from the original on 24 September 2021. Retrieved 24 September 2021.
  3. ^ "Lords Spiritual and Temporal". Parliament UK. Archived from the original on 8 March 2023. Retrieved 7 June 2023.
  4. ^ "Another place". UK Parliament. Retrieved 7 June 2023.
  5. ^ "Role and work of the House of Lords". Parliament UK. Retrieved 18 June 2023.
  6. ^ "House of Lords Building". Parliament UK. Retrieved 8 June 2023.
  7. ^ "Timeline: The House of Lords and reform". BBC News. 27 June 2012. Retrieved 2 June 2023.
  8. ^ House of Lords. "The History of the House of Lords" (PDF). Washington Post.
  9. ^ politicsteaching (5 April 2022). "A Brief History of House of Lords Reform". Politics Teaching. Archived from the original on 9 December 2023. Retrieved 2 June 2023.
  10. ^ UCL (2 March 2023). "Launch of new report: 'House of Lords reform: navigating the obstacles'". The Constitution Unit. Retrieved 10 June 2023.
  11. ^ a b c "Joining and leaving the House of Lords". Institute for Government. 1 April 2022. Retrieved 8 June 2023.
  12. ^ "The House and its membership". Parliament UK. Retrieved 10 June 2023.
  13. ^ "What individual Lords do". Parliament of the United Kingdom. Retrieved 29 January 2012.
  14. ^ a b "What the Lords does". Parliament UK. Retrieved 10 June 2023.
  15. ^ "Legislation affecting the House of Lords". Parliament UK. Retrieved 10 June 2023.
  16. ^ Carmichael, Paul; Dickson, Brice (1999). The House of Lords: Its Parliamentary and Judicial Roles. Hart Publishing. p. 16. ISBN 978-1-84113-020-0.
  17. ^ UCL (8 November 2021). "What does the House of Lords do?". The Constitution Unit. Retrieved 10 June 2023.
  18. ^ "The role and reform of the House of Lords". A smaller House of Lords: The report of the Lord Speaker's committee on the size of the House. Parliament UK. 19 November 2018. Retrieved 10 June 2023.
  19. ^ "Ministers". Parallel Parliament. Archived from the original on 10 June 2023. Retrieved 10 June 2023.
  20. ^ Cite error: The named reference Parliament of the United Kingdom-2010 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  21. ^ "What is a vote of no confidence?". BBC. 30 September 2019. Retrieved 9 May 2022.
  22. ^ "Parliamentary sovereignty". Parliament of the United Kingdom. Retrieved 29 January 2012.
  23. ^ Alan Siaroff, Comparing Political Regimes, University of Toronto Press 2013, chapter 6.
  24. ^ Peter Walker (9 February 2024). "Major Tory donor among 13 new peers named in honours list". The Guardian. Retrieved 10 February 2024.
  25. ^ Toksvig, Sandi (5 July 2023). "A seat in the House of Lords isn't God-given. It's time parliament ejected all the bishops". The Guardian.


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