This reminds me of when they cancelled “My Name is Earl”.
This isn’t them abolishing the house of lords, they’re just kicking out the remaining “hereditary peers” who got their seat from inheritance. Most of the house these days are “life peers”:
retired politicians, civic leaders and other notables appointed by the government, who now make up the vast majority of the chamber. Roughly 1 in 10 members are currently hereditary peers.
Even for those remaining hereditary peers they’re supposed to be kicking out:
The lords put up a fight, forcing a compromise that will see an undisclosed number of hereditary members allowed to stay by being “recycled” into life peers.
So not that much of a change.
Eliminating the hereditary principle is a significant change.
The next useful reform would be to appoint peers for a fixed term rather than for life.
Technically the change will be when the old hereditary peers die off or leave the chamber. I’m not a fan of lifetime anything either, but at least those assholes mostly had to do something to earn their place rather than being born warm.
So it’s now pretty similar to Canada’s senate?
Epstein brought down the fucking House of Lords, and here in the US we have not indicted or punished in any way anybody found in those files.
Nothing to do with Epstein
Did you click on the links in the article? I didn’t just hallucinate Epstein out.of the blue.
Abolishing hereditary peers has been Labour’s objective for decades.
Yes, and they weren’t able to do anything this drastic before.
The article does mention Epstein, but this Bill was first introduced to parliament way back in 2024
To give the devil his due, the reforms were started by Blair long before 2024.
And Epstein was killed back in 2019, with his arrest and investigations obviously before that. The Epstein shit has been going on for over a decade, it is by no means new.
While new files have been released more recently, a lot was known before. A fairly large chunk of the files were already released previously as well.
It has, but the article is specifically associating this bill with the more recent reveals about Peter Mandelson. Both general public awareness of Mandelson’s association with Epstein and his appointment as ambassador to the US that brought that connection to the current government’s attention happened well after the introduction of the bill. The article draws no other connection to Epstein whatsoever, only Mandelson
The case of Peter Mandelson, who resigned from the Lords in February after revelations about his friendship with the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, drew renewed attention to the upper chamber and the problem of lords behaving badly.
This is reducing the proportion of hereditary peers and increasing the proportion of life peers. So more appointments like Mandelson’s, not fewer
Mandelson was a life peer, unaffected by this change.
It was literally in the manifesto in 2024.
In real life things happen for multiple reasons. I believe you.
Reforming the House of the Lords has been in manifestos for more than one century now.
Wait, this was still a thing? What in the fuck? Why?
