David Cameron set to revoke House of Lord's absolute veto over secondary legislation

Prime Minister David Cameron is set to strip the House of Lord's powers by revoking the Upper House's absolute veto powers over secondary legislation introduced in Parliament. The Labour party has said the proposed reform was a "massive over-reaction" by the government after peers blocked the Conservatives' welfare cuts.

Under the proposal, peers will instead be given powers to send laws back to the Lower House for a re-vote. The power to force MPs to vote again can only be exercised once.

The new rules will be introduced via primary legislation, effectively becoming a statute. This means that if peers try to oppose Cameron's moves to clip their powers, the government will be able to use the Parliament Act to ensure the House of Lords accept the new rules.

The review, undertaken by former cabinet minister Lord Strathclyde, will be published on 17 December. Cameron is expected to accept most of the recommendations made in the review. The Upper and Lower Houses will be able to debate on the proposed changes in 2016.

The Conservatives do not have a majority in the House of Lords and both Labour and Liberal Democrat peers are expected to use their combined voting powers to challenge any changes to the rule that will effectively curb their powers.

Chancellor George Osborne saw his proposed tax credit cuts thrown out of the Upper House, forcing him to make a U-turn and withdrawing the cuts completely. It was the sixth time in the last 50 years that such a veto had been used. The peers have generally been reluctant to challenge elected MPs through the veto route.

In November, the House of Lords flexed its muscles again and asked for the Scotland Bill to be put on hold until the rules on new tax and spending powers are clarified. It criticised the manner in which the Bill was being progressed with "undue haste" and warned that it should not proceed further until the devolution fiscal framework was published.

Baroness Smith of Basildon, Labour's leader in the Lords said her party will be looking into Lord Strathclyde's report but maintained that she was "still not convinced there was a problem there in the first place. As most people at Parliament know, the government lost a vote on tax credits and in a massive over-reaction have decided to try and change the rules of the game." She continued: That looked churlish at the time and it feels no different now."