Daily Mail boss among 25 new Lords to be created by Truss – as Tories oppose adding new Senedd Members

Daily Mail boss Paul Dacre is among 25 new Lords set to be created by Prime Minister Liz Truss – as the Conservative Party opposes adding new members to the Senedd.

The 25 new Lords are in addition to Boris Johnson’s list of resignation honours which is due to be published in weeks.

They will be added to the swelling ranks of the House of Lords which already has 755 sitting members.

Meanwhile, plans by the Welsh Government co-operation agreement with Plaid Cymru to add 36 new members to the Senedd – bringing the total to 96 – are opposed by the Conservative Party.

The full list of political peerages that is on the brink of being announced by Downing Street was revealed by the Telegraph tonight.

Among those on the list are Arlene Foster, the former First Minister of Northern Ireland, who will sit as a cross-bencher.

There are also 15 new Conservative peers, eight new Labour peers and one DUP. Labour’s peerages, proposed by the party leader Sir Keir Starmer, include the party’s former deputy leader Tom Watson.

Welsh Conservative leader Andrew RT Davies has repeatedly criticised the idea of more Senedd Members, saying last Saturday: “Putting 36 more Senedd Members in Cardiff Bay would cost us £100 million in the first five years alone. Let’s fund our NHS instead.”

First Minister Mark Drakeford has already accused the Conservatives of complaining about expansion of the Senedd on one hand while increasing the number of peers in the House of Lords on the other.

Earlier this year he asked: “Every nine months, the Prime Minister appoints more people to the House of Lords than we propose adding to the membership of the Senedd—every nine months. Where’s the referendum on that, I wonder?”