Can a peerage be removed? Starmer told to remove Lord Mandelson's title
Prime minister called to strip Lord Mandelson of his peerage
Sir Keir Starmer is under pressure to remove Peter Mandelson’s peerage, after it emerged the former business secretary had given confidential government documents to Jeffrey Epstein.
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Lord Mandelson has now left the Labour Party after the latest Epstein Files showed that he used his position in the Cabinet to share insight with the sex offender financier, who died by suicide in 2019.
Having already removed him from his role as ambassador to the US after previous links to Epstein emerged, Sir Keir is now being called on to remove the lord’s peerage.
It follows the Palace's removal of all of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s titles, including his prince status, with the eighth in line to the throne having also been heavily implicated in the Epstein files.
Lord Mandelson has been a life peer since 2008. But while we have seen it is possible for a royal title to be revoked, is it possible for a peerage to be taken away?
Can a peerage be removed?
It is possible to remove a peerage, but it is a tricky and complicated bureaucratic process to take it away from the holder.
The prime minister has powers to order a peerage to be removed, and this came into effect last year when Andrew lost his titles and status.
While Parliament confirmed last year that peerages can be removed, there has not been an act introduced on the matter since 1917, when Prince Charles Edward, Duke of Albany, lost his royal status after he fought for the German side in the First World War and later became a Nazi.
Fellow German collaborator Prince Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, later also lost his titles under the same act.
“Peerages are created by letters patent: a legal document issued by the sovereign and adorned with the great seal,” Parliament states in its guidance.
“The great seal (formally known as the great seal of the realm) is the chief seal of the crown It is used to show the monarch’s approval of state documents. As explained in Halsbury’s Laws of England, the crown does not have the power to cancel a peerage once it has been created.”
A life peerage cannot be relinquished, but the House of Lords Reform Act 2014 enables a life peer to resign from being a member.