General Election 2015: House of Lords could swell to nearly 1,000 if Labour wins

There could be two-and-a-half ennobled bottoms for every seat in the House of Lords following the general election this week, strengthening the case for an overhaul of the unelected second chamber.

Stephen Twigg, who speaks for Labour on constitutional reform, told The Independent on Sunday that the Lords will swell to nearly 1,000 peers if Labour wins the election.

There is enough space in the House of Lords benches for only about 400 peers, yet there are already more than 840 of them, up from 708 a decade ago. About 50 are currently ineligible, most of whom have taken a leave of absence because of work commitments or illness, and many of them will return.

The number will grow whatever the result on Thursday, as David Cameron will be allowed the traditional dissolution honours list. Gordon Brown announced 56 peerages after he lost the 2010 election.

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But should Ed Miliband get the keys to No 10, modern convention dictates that he will rebalance the Lords so that it loosely reflects the composition of the Commons. That would mean a swathe of additional Labour peers. The Tories currently have an advantage of about 10 peers over Labour. Once members of all parties and crossbenchers are appointed, including former leaders and deputy leaders, and Labour has boosted its own numbers, the Lords membership is likely to increase by at least one tenth.

China’s politburo is the only bigger legislative chamber in the world. Mr Cameron and his Lib Dem deputy, Nick Clegg, have been accused of using their powers of patronage freely, appointing an average of 40 peers a year during coalition. By contrast, Mr Brown appointed about 12 a year, John Major 25 and Margaret Thatcher 18. Tony Blair and Harold Wilson, in his second term, were also fond of creating peers, appointing 37 and 38 respectively.

Mr Twigg said: “We need to see reform, as we will be heading towards 1,000 peers, raising questions over how an unelected chamber can be so much bigger than an elected chamber. If nothing changes, the numbers are just going to go up and up because of this new convention to broadly reflect voting [patterns].”

Labour has pledged to hold a constitutional convention to examine options for all sorts of reforms, including the issue of English MPs and their voting power as Scotland gains greater devolved powers.

Angela Eagle, the shadow Leader of the House of Commons, said: “Here we are, in a hard-fought election, trying to get people to vote and then we have this ridiculous convention so the House of Lords just grows and grows. It’s a democratic outrage.”

A senior Conservative who has previously called for substantial parliamentary reform added: “There’s a broad consensus that the Lords is already too big. A lot of people are hacked off and there should be a freeze on its size.”

Professor Meg Russell, deputy director at University College London’s constitutional unit, said the next prime minister has the power to do what he wants – including refusing to appoint a single peer. “They should do the right thing and stop all this silly nonsense,” she said.