Rule of law: slow progress on UK House of Lords reform threatens democracy
Polly BotsfordFriday 10 April 2026
The House of Lords chamber. © House of Lords 2016 - Roger Harris/Flickr (CC BY-NC 2.0)
Eighteen months after the UK’s assisted dying bill was introduced to Parliament, its progress has stalled in the House of Lords. Peers have put forward over 1,200 amendments to the Bill – the highest number of any legislation in 20 years. The Bill’s proponents now say the delays have effectively made it impossible for the legislation to pass before the end of the current parliamentary session, despite its successful passage through the House of Commons in June 2025.
This lack of progress has highlighted the tension between the unelected Lords and the effective functioning of the UK’s democracy – and heightened calls for substantial reform of the chamber.
Amid the delays, there have been accusations that members of the Lords have deliberately wasted time by ‘filibustering’ in an attempt to ‘talk out’ the Bill, although peers have denied this. An early day motion was tabled in February by Members of Parliament suggesting that if ‘filibuster tactics’ are used in the House of Lords, the case for the chamber’s ‘outright abolition’ is strengthened.
The bill in question would legalise assisted dying for terminally ill, mentally competent adults. Given the subject matter and the moral arguments it raises, it’s unsurprisingly a contentious piece of legislation. It’s also a private member’s bill and individual lawmakers are being allowed to vote as they choose. However, the optics of the situation appear concerning. The UK’s elected House of Commons supports the Bill, but it’s being blocked by a handful of peers from parliament’s unelected upper chamber. ‘It weakens parliament as a whole if the House of Lords can be described as out of date, or undemocratic,’ says Professor Meg Russell, Director of the Constitution Unit, University College London.
A second house is intended to serve as check and balance, and, if constituted and operated correctly, it can help in protecting and promoting the rule of law
Tahera Mandviwala
Member, IBA Rule of Law Forum Advisory Board
Reform of the House of Lords has been under discussion for some time and is the subject of legislation successfully passed in March, which abolishes the 92 hereditary peers that still remain. Some of those hereditary peers are expected to ultimately remain in the Lords however, as the UK government will offer life peerages to a number of those losing their current roles. ‘Hereditary peers occupy their positions based on their birth and not on merit or public mandate. This undermines democratic principles in a modern constitutional system, and it has also been one of the causes for public distrust in [the Lords],’ says Tahera Mandviwala, Member of the IBA Rule of Law Forum Advisory Board.
However, there are other aspects of the House of Lords that critics say need reform. For example, there are currently over 800 peers. When the chamber was last overhauled in 1999, the number of peers at the time was somewhat higher and the figure was subsequently reduced to under 700. However, membership has steadily increased since then. The House of Lords itself has been vocal in highlighting this issue, with a specific committee within the chamber having reported on it for many years. The committee published a proposal to reduce the House’s numbers back in 2017, for example.
Lawmakers have also put forward other proposals, including a mandatory retirement age, a participation requirement and an attempt to improve the chamber’s ‘national and regional balance.’ But these weren’t included in the reforms passed in March. For Russell, it’s a wasted opportunity. ‘This was the moment to address and legislate on its size. It was a once-in-a-generation opportunity to tackle a problem that is well-known, and the current government hasn’t done that with [the bill removing the hereditary peers],’ she says.
Reform is worth doing not only because it improves the legitimacy of parliament overall, but also because it has a critical role to play in a properly functioning legislature. ‘A second house is intended to serve as check and balance, and, if constituted and operated correctly, it can help in protecting and promoting the rule of law,’ says Mandviwala, who’s a partner at TDT Legal.
‘There is often successful pushback on legal, constitutional and propriety issues from the Lords,’ says Russell. ‘Look at the recent interventions such as over immigration legislation, or the post-Brexit Internal Markets Bill, or, historically, over ID cards, for example.’ The House of Lords can bring a range of experience and expertise, with members having backgrounds in areas such as business, law, tech or defence, for example.
In December, the government appointed a new Retirement and Participation Committee to look at further proposals for change. It will assess, for example, the impact that a retirement age and a participation requirement would have on the Lords, and how these reforms could be implemented. The Committee is required to complete its work by the end of July. However, it’s increasingly unlikely that the government will have the time to revisit the issue of Lords reform over the next few years.
If the impasse over the assisted dying bill can’t be overcome, however, the government may have to resort to the Parliament Act 1911. This allows for laws to be passed even if they are rejected by the Lords. Though it’s unclear how this would play out procedurally, in such a scenario, public concerns regarding the recent actions of the House of Lords could bring the question of reform back to the top of the agenda.