Peerage Act 1963

The Peerage Act 1963 (c. 48) is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that permits female hereditary peers and all Scottish hereditary peers to sit in the House of Lords and allows newly inherited hereditary peerages to be disclaimed.

A disclaimed peerage remains without a holder until the death of the disclaimer, and his heir succeeds to the peerage.

The act resulted largely from the protests of the Labour politician Tony Benn, then the 2nd Viscount Stansgate. Under British law at the time, peers of England, peers of Great Britain and peers of the United Kingdom who met certain qualifications, such as age (21), were automatically members of the House of Lords and could not sit in or vote in elections for the lower chamber, the House of Commons.

At the time of the act, thirty-one peers in the peerage of Scotland also had held titles in the respective peerages of England, Great Britain and the United Kingdom and were thus members of the Lords.

When William Wedgwood Benn, Benn's father, agreed to accept the viscountcy, he ascertained that the heir apparent, his eldest son, Michael, did not plan to enter the Commons. However, within a few years of the peerage being accepted, Michael was killed in action in the Second World War. Tony, his younger brother, became heir apparent to the peerage and was elected to the Commons at the 1950 general election. Not wishing to leave it for the other House, he campaigned through the 1950s for a change in the law. In 1960 the 1st Viscount died and Tony inherited the title, automatically losing his seat in the Commons as the member of Parliament for Bristol South East. In the ensuing by-election, however, Benn was returned to the Commons, despite being disqualified. An election court subsequently ruled that he could not take his seat, instead awarding it to the runner-up, the Conservative Party candidate, Malcolm St Clair.

In 1963 the Conservative government agreed to introduce a Peerage Bill, allowing individuals to disclaim peerages; it received royal assent on 31 July 1963. Tony Benn was the first peer to make use of the act. St Clair, fulfilling a promise he had made at the time of taking his seat, accepted the office of Steward of the Manor of Northstead the previous day, thereby disqualifying himself from the House (outright resignation is prohibited), and Benn was then re-elected in Bristol South East at the ensuing by-election.

To disclaim a hereditary peerage, the peer must deliver an instrument of disclaimer to the Lord Chancellor within one year of succeeding to the peerage, or within one year after the passage of the act, or, if under the age of 21 at the time of succession, before the peer's 22nd birthday. If, at the time of succession, the peer is a member of the House of Commons, then the instrument must be delivered within one month of succession, and until such an instrument is delivered, the peer may neither sit nor vote in the lower House. Prior to the House of Lords Act 1999, a hereditary peer could not disclaim a peerage after having applied for a writ of summons to Parliament; now, however, hereditary peers do not have the automatic right to a writ of summons to the House. A peer who disclaims the peerage loses all titles, rights and privileges associated with the peerage; if they are married, so does their spouse. No further hereditary peerage may be conferred upon the person, but a life peerage may be. The peerage remains without a holder until the death of the peer who had made the disclaimer, whereupon it descends to his or her heir in the usual manner.

The one-year window after the passage of the act soon proved to be of importance at the highest levels of British politics, after the resignation of Harold Macmillan as prime minister in October 1963. Two hereditary peers wished to be considered to replace him, but by this time it was considered requisite for a prime minister to sit in the Commons. Quintin Hogg, 2nd Viscount Hailsham, and Alec Douglas-Home, 14th Earl of Home, took advantage of the act to disclaim their peerages, despite having inherited them in 1950 and 1951 respectively. Sir Alec Douglas-Home, as Lord Home now became, was chosen as prime minister; both men later returned to the Lords as life peers.