Britain removes hereditary seats from House of Lords

Britain’s parliament has approved legislation to remove the remaining hereditary peers from the House of Lords, ending a centuries-old system of aristocratic ​seats in the upper chamber that the government says should not ‌be secured by birth, Reuters writes.

The House of Lords passed the Hereditary Peers Bill on Tuesday evening, fulfilling a reform launched more than 25 years ago and a key manifesto pledge from Prime ​Minister Keir Starmer’s Labour government to modernise the upper chamber.

Angela Smith, the ​leader of the upper chamber, said in a statement on Tuesday ⁠that the Lords played a “vital role within our bicameral parliament, but nobody should ​sit in the House by virtue of an inherited title”.

Before the reform, 92 hereditary peers could ​still sit and vote in the upper chamber, a number retained as an ​interim compromise after more than 600 were removed in 1999 under Tony Blair, the former ‌Labour prime ⁠minister, who had labelled the hereditary system an “anachronism.”