A cross-party committee of senior peers has criticised Boris Johnson for bringing the honours system into question.
In a report published on Monday, the six-member panel, including two former Conservative ministers, noted with disapproval Johnson’s attempts to fill the Lords with his supporters.
The report on the size of the second chamber said: “In recent months, there have been further developments which have brought the appointments system into question. Most notably, there was considerable controversy over the size and composition of prime minister Boris Johnson’s resignation list, with over half of initial nominees not being approved by the House of Lords appointments commission [Holac].”
The Lords committee said Johnson “showed no interest” in reducing the number of peers during his three years in No 10, and it noted that the number of new appointments he made “far exceeded” the target set by the upper house.
The report said Johnson’s nominations were “granted predominantly to members of his own party”.
The damaging row over his honours lists has prompted one of the three byelections being held this week, and another is highly probable in the coming months.
Johnson appointed seven new peers to the Lords, including a former political aide, Charlotte Owen, who at 29 becomes the youngest ever life peer.
The list also included the former Tory London mayoral candidate Shaun Bailey, who attended a “jingle and mingle” Christmas party during the Covid lockdown of December 2020.
Bailey, who has faced calls for his peerage to be blocked, has apologised for his attendance at the party. The event is being reinvestigated by the police after video that was filmed after Bailey left was leaked to the Mirror.
More than half of Johnson’s nominations to the Lords were not accepted by Holac. The peerages of the former culture secretary Nadine Dorries and the former Foreign Office minister Nigel Adams were reportedly blocked because of rules on not being able to sit in both chambers.
Allies of Johnson accused Rishi Sunak of removing names from the final list; No 10 denied the claim.
Adams resigned as an MP after the decision, prompting a byelection this week in Selby and Ainsty. Dorries announced her intention to quit as the MP for Mid Bedfordshire but has yet to formally resign.
The Lords committee has recommended imposing a fixed-term limit, possibly of about 15 years, for service in the upper house and called for a fairer allocation of new appointments that are based on election results.
It said reducing the size of the Lords had become a “second-order issue”, with the priority to introduce a “sustainable” appointments system, ideally via legislation or otherwise by consensus among the political parties.
Peers in 2017 recommended that the numbers in the Lords be capped at 600 to make it smaller than the Commons. But the numbers have continued to balloon, with the latest report suggesting there are 824 members, making it one of the largest scrutiny chambers in the world.
The committee has reiterated its call for an end to byelections for hereditary peers to help reduce the overall numbers in the Lords and provide a better gender balance, given all 90 are men.
The prospect of Labour winning the next general election has raised the possibility of attempts being made to rapidly redress the political imbalance in the Lords.
The report said Labour would be placed in a difficult position if it were to win a majority, given its 181 party-affiliated peers make up “not much more than 20%” of the Lords. Their average age is 75, seven years higher than that of the Conservative group.
The Labour leader, Keir Starmer, who has committed to abolishing unelected peers, has remarked on the “imbalance” in the Lords and his spokesperson has hinted that the party could need to steadily appoint peers to ensure it can get its legislative agenda through.
The lord speaker’s committee said gradual changes to the makeup of the house could ensure a party was not put in the same situation again.
The committee suggested new appointments should be allocated on the basis of an average of each party’s share of their Commons seats and the national vote at the most recent general election.
“This would have a gradual impact on the political balance of the parties, reflecting each party’s electoral fortunes over time while also allowing each party to refresh its own membership,” the report said.
Lords Burns, who chairs the committee, said: “The political leadership should focus initially on putting in place a sustainable and fair method of allocating appointments. This will set the basis for a cap and a sustainable reduction in the size of the house.”
