IT was another pretty momentous week in Parliament last week.

As well as being one of eleven other Labour MPs that took the GB Energy Bill through the Committee stage and therefore one step closer to the statute book, I was delighted to vote to end the hereditary right of peers in the House of Lords. This will affect 92 peers – all of whom are men.

There are currently no female hereditary peers in the House of Lords. Hereditary peerages are overwhelmingly inherited by men. Amazingly, female hereditary peers were only allowed to take seats in the House of Lords following the Peerage Act 1963. Yet only 25 female hereditary peers were admitted to the House of Lords between 1963 and 1999.

There were five female hereditary peers immediately after the 1999 reforms; all were elected to stay on following those reforms. Since then, three of the five have since died and two have retired. All five were replaced through by-elections for hereditary peers by men.

The idea that, in the 21st century, because of a right of birth, you automatically have a place in the House of Lords and therefore an ability to influence government policy is anachronistic nonsense. The UK is one of only two countries that still have a hereditary element to our legislature.

Of course, in the House of Commons during the debate the Conservatives, for a variety of really quite strange and diverse reasons, tried to argue against us making this long-overdue change to the House of Lords. But the change was overwhelmingly voted through.

Personally, I would like to see House of Lords reforms go even further, and I was delighted to hear the Minister state that this is the start of a programme of reform, rather than the end of it. A change I would very much like to see is the removal of the 26 seats reserved for Church of England bishops.

As the National Secular Society argues: “Giving individuals automatic seats in the legislature because they are religious clerics is at least as archaic, elitist, unfair and indefensible as the seats given to hereditary peers.”

I have some sympathy with this view. Like hereditary peers, the bishops are unelected and are appointed due to their hierarchical position in the Church, rather than on merit. This situation has arisen because of the Church of England’s status, and no other religious leaders are given seats as of right in the House of Lords. In my view, it’s time for an honest debate as to whether or not, in 2024, it is time to make a change, as part of this government’s plans to reform the House of Lords.

I think, having made the change to the hereditary peers, we should also make the change to the status of the bishops of the Church of England and attempt to make the House of Lords more representative of the people over whom the legislation that they scrutinise applies.

Perran Moon

Labour MP for Camborne and Redruth