Life peers named
A number of high profile former ministers and select committee chairs have been named as life peers by Downing Street this morning.
Former Education Secretary Estelle Morris, Culture Secretary Chris Smith, and the former chairmen of the Foreign Affairs and the Trade and Industry Select Committees, Donald Anderson and Martin O’Neill, head the list of those named.
Clive Soley and Jean Corston, two former chairs of the Parliamentary Labour Party were also named, along with former Agriculture Minister Jack Cunningham and Sports Minister Tony Banks.
For the Conservatives, Virginia Bottomley, Gillian Shephard and Brian Mawhinney, who served respectively as Health, Education and Transport Secretaries under the Major government, all get life peerages.
Liberal Democrats Dr Jenny Tonge, Paul Tyler, Nigel Jones, Sir Archibald Kirkwood and David Chidgey featured among the 27 strong list.
Elsewhere for Labour there were peerages for former Advocate General Lynda Clark, chief whip Ann Taylor, Scotland Office Minister George Foulkes, and Defence Minister Lewis Moonie, along with backbenchers Irene Adams, Derek Foster and Dennis Turner.
Sir Alastair Goodlad, former Conservative MP and until recently the High Commissioner to Australia, Margaret Thatcher’s former private secretary Sir Archibald Hamilton, and former Conservative Attorney General Sir Nicholas Lyell complete the list.
