Member

As I have said, the Bill abolishes the role of the House of Lords in determining the claims, but without putting a replacement system into law. We need clarity for Ministers about how this will work in future. I hope that, when the noble and learned Lord the Attorney-General replies, he sets out what provisions will be made for Irish Peers to claim their titles, after the role of the House of Lords in these claims has been abolished, because that would expressly fall away. Can the noble and learned Lord confirm that it is the Government’s intention that claimants to Irish peerages will need to apply only to the Lord Chancellor to be entered on the Roll of the Peerage in the first instance; and that complex or disputed Irish peerage claims would also be referred to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, in the same way that complex or disputed claims to other peerages will be?