Peter Mandelson should save his slimming tips for the House of Lords Lord Peter Mandelson found himself in the headlines a couple of times this week. Firstly, when he criticised Labour’s plans to scrap the unelected Lords and replace it with an elected chamber that better represents... Posted 07 Mar 2024
Why an elected second chamber won’t lead to gridlock Looking across the Atlantic at America’s Senate, it’s clear why concerns are often expressed that an elected second chamber may challenge the primacy of the House of Commons and at the extreme end, result in... Posted 19 Feb 2024
As more peers are crammed in the Lords, the public support elected members Late on Friday, the Government slipped out its latest honours list, which will add 13 new peers to the already-heaving House of Lords. Among the newly-ennobled are the usual clutch of party donors and advisors.... Posted 13 Feb 2024
What is a Senate of the Regions and Nations? Over the years many parties and groups have suggested ideas for reform of the House of Lords. Recently, the Labour party has suggested that the House of Lords should be replaced with a ‘Senate of... Posted 01 Feb 2024
What is the role of the House of Lords and could it do more? While the House of Lords is often in the press, it’s often due to the things its members should not be doing, rather than the work it does do. The chamber though has an important... Posted 29 Jan 2024
ERS in the Press – January 2024 Despite being one of our country’s shortest ever Prime Ministers Liz Truss dominated the headlines over the festive period. The ERS press team were ready and waiting to get our arguments around the House of... Posted 18 Jan 2024
The UK’s shortest serving PM hands out peerages to friends and supporters In the days between Christmas and New Year, the government tried to quietly slip out some bad news – it hoped many people would be too distracted by remnant cheeseboards and left-over Turkey to notice... Posted 02 Jan 2024
Which is the best electoral system for the House of Lords? Whenever the issue of creating an elected Second Chamber comes up, a common question is how it should be elected. Thankfully, one of the areas of agreement on Lords reform over the years has been... Posted 27 Dec 2023
How many peers are there in the House of Lords – and how many does it need? One of the unique features of our currently second chamber, apart from it being unelected and still partially based on inherited titles, is that its membership is huge. At over 800 peers in total, not... Posted 21 Dec 2023
The top 5 most-read ERS articles from 2023 Every year we have a look through the stats to see which of our articles were the most popular with readers in the year coming to a close. So if you missed them the first... Posted 14 Dec 2023