It has emerged that No 10 is thinking of breaching a hitherto inviolable constitutional convention by announcing peerages, but deferring their actual conferment.
Boris Johnson wants to give a number of serving Conservative MPs peerages in his resignation honours list. Ms Truss wants to avoid the by-elections which would follow. So she may ask the King to approve the nominations now so that they can be announced, but without bringing the peerages into existence until after the next general election.
The Times revealed this extraordinary, and very bad, idea in an article published on October 8, having consulted a number of people interested in the constitution about it, of whom Alistair Lexden was one. The article quoted his view that it would “amount to a large extension of patronage”. He added: “there is no law which prevents this, but precedent and good constitutional practice surely count against it.”
There is no precedent whatsoever. In a recent years one or two people have been made peers, but delayed taking their seats in the House because they were working as special advisers to government ministers. No prime minister has ever proposed a post-dated peerage: one that would come into existence at some point in the future.
When a life peerage is announced, the process at once begins of issuing letters patent conferring the title and preparing a writ of summons to the House. This has been so even in the few instances where a life peerage has been created in circumstances when it was clear that the recipient would not be able to take part in the work of the House for some time. This traditional procedure would of course have to be abrogated if a post-dated peerage was proposed.
Good constitutional practice also argues against this disgraceful proposition. As Alistair Lexden told The Times: “If it were allowed, what would there be to stop a prime minister announcing multiple lists of peers, to take years or decades ahead? This would be especially tempting if a prime minister looked like losing an election or being forced from office.”
It was once inconceivable that a Conservative leader would fail to respect the constitution and its conventions. In this as in many other things, Boris Johnson flouted Conservative principle. It now seems possible that his successor will follow suit.
