Seb Coe

[Lindy66]

Can anyone tell me how he became a Lord ?

How is it 'decided' who becomes a lord ?

I always thought a lord was a kind of hand me down title, is he's family some kind of aristocat ?

[SeaJayPea]

He was given a Life Peerage in 2001after he had been William Hague's Chief of Staff for the previous four years. He lost his parliamentary seat at Falmouth in the 1997 general election.

The idea of hereditary peerages has gone out of the window, more or less. The vast majority of members of the House of Lords now are Life Peers, only 80 of the old boys are allowed to stay. 

Every party leader gets to nominate some people each year to go into the House of Lords in either the Queen's Birthday Honours list in June or the New Year's Honours list.

There is now a difference between having a hereditary title and being a member of the House of Lords, it changed a couple of years back and the hereditaries were kicked out, apart from the 80 mentioned before.

Hope this helps

[kev100]

He is a rabid Tory, and thats all it takes to become a Lord, one of the most worthless human beings in British political history is Norman Lamont. Guess how he got to be a lord?

[Grunty]

Kev100 - I don't like rabid Tories any more than you do (or rabid anything else for that matter) but this is the composition of the House of Lords

Conservative  208

Labour  214

Liberal Democrat  74

Crossbenchers (independent)  185

Other  13

Bishops  25

http://www.parliament.uk/directories/directories21.cfm

[kev100]

I agree with you Grunty I'm not saying it is one sided I'm just saying that the honours system in this country has been so abused by politicians that it has become completely worthless.

[Narolines]

Hereditary peers are still hereditary peers; it's just that most of them no longer have an automatic seat in the House of Lords - so the idea hasn't gone out of the window, just had its political teeth drawn.