Ministerial Salaries (Amendment) Bill: HL Bill 179 of 2024–26

Approximate read time: 15 minutes

The Ministerial Salaries (Amendment) Bill is a government bill that would increase the total number of ministerial salaries that could be paid from 109 to 120. The government has said this would reflect the average size of governments since 2010 and would largely end the practice of having unpaid ministers.

During the passage of the House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Act 2026, the House of Lords voted in favour of a Conservative amendment to restrict the appointment of unpaid ministers in the House of Lords. This amendment was not retained in the version of the act that received royal assent, but the government introduced the current bill ahead of the House considering Commons reasons for disagreeing the earlier amendment.

The current bill completed its Commons stages on 17 March 2026. No amendments were tabled. It was introduced in the House of Lords on 18 March 2026 and is due to have its second reading and remaining stages on 14 April 2026. It has been certified as a money bill, which means it can become law with or without House of Lords approval.

1. Why has the government introduced the bill? 1.1 Statutory limits on ministerial salaries

The bill would increase the total number of ministerial salaries that can be paid. There is no limit on the total number of ministers who can be appointed to the government, but there are other statutory limits to the number of ministers:

• The Ministerial and other Salaries Act 1975 limits the total number of paid ministerial posts to 109.
• The House of Commons Disqualification Act 1975 limits the number of ministers, including whips, in the House of Commons to 95. The limit of 95 applies whether the ministers are paid or unpaid.

There is no equivalent statutory limit on the number of ministerial posts in the House of Lords. Taken together, the two acts mean that if the full number of ministers were appointed in the House of Commons, there could be only 14 paid ministers in the House of Lords. There is no limit on the number of unpaid ministers in the Lords.

The Ministerial and other Salaries Act 1975 imposes other restrictions on how the 109 salaries can be distributed between different ministerial ranks and certain offices, as shown in table 1. The total is reached by combining the cumulative maximum number of positions for secretaries of state, ministers of state and parliamentary secretaries (83), together with the maximum numbers for other specified positions.

Table 1. Distribution of ministerial salaries

Position

Maximum number

Secretary of state

21

Secretary of state + minister of state (cumulative)

50

Secretary of state + minister of state + parliamentary secretary (cumulative)

83

Junior lord of the Treasury (typically paid to a government whip in the House of Commons

5

Assistant whip in the House of Commons

7

Lord in waiting (typically paid to a government whip in the House of Lords)

5

Salaries for specific offices:

• lord chancellor
• attorney general
• solicitor general
• advocate general for Scotland
• treasurer of His Majesty’s household (typically paid to the House of Commons deputy chief whip)
• comptroller of His Majesty’s household (typically paid to a government whip in the House of Commons)
• vice-chamberlain of His Majesty’s household (typically paid to a government whip in the House of Commons)
• captain of the honourable corps of gentleman-at-arms (typically paid to the chief whip in the House of Lords)
• captain of the King’s bodyguard of the yeoman of the guard (typically the Lords deputy chief whip)

9

Total

109

1.2 Trends in ministerial appointments

There has been a general upward trend in the total number of ministers in governments since the 1970s. Table 2 shows the number of ministers on the first day that Parliament sat after each general election from 1979 to 2024.

Table 2. Ministers in government after general elections

Year

Total number of ministers

1979

106

1983

103

1987

104

1992

107

1997

112

2001

111

2005

113

2010

118

2015

118

2017

118

2019

116

2024

112

For several decades, governments have been appointing more ministers than can be paid under the limit of 109 salaries. This means that some ministers have been unpaid. They have predominantly been ministers in the House of Lords. In the explanatory notes to the bill, the government calculated the average number of ministers, and the average number of unpaid ministers in each House, for all governments since the coalition government in 2010, as shown in table 3.

Table 3. Average number of ministers and unpaid ministers per administration, 2010–present

Administration

Average number of ministers

Average number of unpaid Commons ministers

Average number of unpaid Lords ministers

Coalition
2010–15

121

3

10

Cameron
2015–16

118

3

7

May
2016–19

118

4

6

Johnson
2019–22

119

4

8

Truss
2022

121

3

11

Sunak
2022–24

123

3

13

Starmer
2024–present

120

2

9

The figures in the table are approximate averages over the lifetime of each administration. The actual numbers for the current government are higher. There are:

• 122 ministers in the government (including whips)
• 93 ministers in the House of Commons, of whom two are unpaid
• 29 ministers in the House of Lords, of whom 11 are unpaid

1.3 House of Lords amendment on unpaid Lords ministers

The question of unpaid ministers in the House of Lords was raised during the passage of the House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Act 2026. At report stage, the House of Lords voted in favour of an amendment to restrict the appointment of new unpaid ministers in the House of Lords. However, the House of Commons rejected this amendment, and it was not included in the version of the bill that received royal assent.

Lord True, shadow leader of the House of Lords, tabled amendment 13 at report stage to insert a new clause requiring that ministers could be eligible for membership of the House of Lords only if they were in receipt of, or had been offered, a salary under the Ministerial and other Salaries Act 1975. He also tabled amendment 13A (an amendment to his own amendment) which made clear that this would not apply to ministers who had been appointed before the new provision came into force. Lord True said the purpose of his amendments was to send a “clear message” to the House of Commons and to all governments that service as a minister in the House of Lords should be “properly remunerated”. He argued this would reflect three important principles: a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work, equal treatment of ministers in both Houses, and that nobody should be prevented from serving as a minister for the lack of private means.

Baroness Smith of Basildon, leader of the House of Lords, agreed the principle of ministers being paid was “an absolutely sound one”. However, she did not support the amendment, arguing it “would not mean that any currently unpaid Lords ministers would receive a salary”. She suggested that since it did not increase the maximum number of paid ministers or the number of salaries available for Lords ministers, it would “put limits on the ability of the prime minister to choose the ministers he or she seeks to choose” and was therefore “not a practical solution to what we all agree is a problem”. She proposed a better way forward would be a separate bill to increase the overall number of ministerial salaries available or to ring-fence the number of Lords ministers within the total number of ministers.

Amendment 13A was agreed to on division, by 284 votes to 239. Amendment 13, incorporating amendment 13A, was then added to the bill without division.

When the bill returned to the Commons, the amendment was defeated on division by 336 votes to 77. Nick Thomas-Symonds, paymaster general and minister for the Cabinet Office, argued it would “do little to address the problem it seeks to resolve” and would only reduce the number of ministers in the Lords and limit prime ministerial prerogative powers.

The House of Lords did not insist on its amendment when it considered the bill again on 10 March 2026. Baroness Smith of Basildon said Lord True’s amendment had “raised an important principle” but was not relevant to the bill to remove hereditary peers from the House of Lords. She said she was pleased the government had instead decided to address the issue by introducing the Ministerial Salaries (Amendment) Bill, which would ensure there could be a minimum of 25 paid ministers in the House of Lords. Lord True and the Earl of Kinnoull, the convenor of the Crossbench peers, both welcomed the new bill.

2. Bill provisions

Clause 1 would amend the Ministerial and other Salaries Act 1975 to increase the number of ministerial salaries that could be paid as follows:

• The maximum number of salaries that could be paid to secretaries of state would increase from 21 to 22.
• The maximum number of salaries that could be paid to secretaries of state plus ministers of state would increase from 50 to 54.
• The maximum number of salaries that could be paid to secretaries of state plus ministers of state plus parliamentary secretaries would increase from 83 to 94.

This means that the total number of ministerial salaries that could be paid would increase by 11 from 109 to 120. The bill is making no changes to the House of Commons Disqualification Act 1975, so the limit of 95 ministers in the House of Commons remains.

It follows that if the maximum number of ministers were appointed in the House of Commons and they all received a salary there would be 25 salaries left available for ministers in the House of Lords (120 minus 95).

However, more salaries for Lords ministers would be available if fewer ministerial salaries were paid in the Commons. There are currently 91 ministers in the Commons receiving a ministerial salary. If the bill passed, that would mean 29 ministerial salaries could be paid in the Lords (120 minus 91), enough to pay all the current Lords ministers.

Clause 2 provides for the bill’s extent, commencement and short title. It would extend to England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland and would come into force on the day on which it was passed. The bill’s provisions apply only to ministers in the UK government, not to ministers in the devolved governments.

The bill has been certified by the speaker of the House of Commons as a money bill. This means that in his opinion, its provisions deal only with national (but not local) taxation, public money or loans or their management. In practice this limits the extent to which the House of Lords can propose significant changes and means the bill can become law with or without House of Lords approval.

3. Costs

The bill is not increasing the amount of any individual ministerial salaries, but the total amount spent on ministers’ salaries would increase if more ministers were paid. The government has said the amount of the increase would depend on several factors:

• how many additional salaries are allocated
• which ministerial ranks they are allocated to
• whether they are allocated to Commons or Lords ministers—Lords ministers’ salaries are higher to account for the fact they are not paid a parliamentary salary

The government estimates that the likely financial implications of the bill are an increase in ministerial salary costs of £600,000–£850,000 per year, or approximately 13–19%. Any employer pension contributions, severance payments and Lords office holders allowance payable would be on top of this.

Separately, the government has introduced secondary legislation that would (once approved by both Houses of Parliament) reset the level of ministerial salaries and change the statutory formula that determines salary increases each financial year. However, the government has said the actual take-home pay for ministers will remain unchanged.

The government laid the draft Ministerial and other Salaries Act 1975 (Amendment) Order 2026 before both Houses on 5 March 2026. It has said the order is necessary because the formula for calculating ministerial salaries has not been applied correctly since its implementation in 1997. The formula dictates that the salaries of ministers and certain other office holders should be adjusted each year in accordance with the average percentage by which the mid-points of senior civil service pay bands have increased. However, during the 2023/24 financial year, the Cabinet Office identified that the formula had been misapplied as it appeared that the salaries of permanent secretaries had often been excluded from the calculation, despite this not being permitted by the original order in council that set out the formula. The new order would reset entitled salary amounts by applying the existing statutory formula correctly (in other words, including the permanent secretary pay band) each year since the discrepancy was noticed. It would also change the formula so that in future permanent secretary pay would be excluded from the calculation, which the government says would be “in line with the longstanding policy”. The House of Lords Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee has welcomed the intended correction, and the House of Commons has considered the instrument.

While the statutory formula calculates the pay rise that ministers and certain other office holders are entitled to, in practice they do not necessarily claim it. The government has explained that “ministerial pay—with the exception of Lords’ pay in 2019—has not risen since 2008, and claimed salaries remain frozen today”. The other office holders covered by the Ministerial and other Salaries Act 1975 have each made a personal decision each year whether or not to waive their entitled salary (that is, the salary including the pay rise calculated according to the formula). The government confirmed during debate on the Ministerial Salaries (Amendment) Bill in the House of Commons that the ministerial pay freeze remained in place.

4. House of Commons stages

The government introduced the bill in the House of Commons on 5 March 2025. The bill completed all its remaining Commons stages on 17 March 2025.

4.1 Second reading

Nick Thomas-Symonds, paymaster general and minister for the Cabinet Office, said raising the cap on the number of ministerial salaries from 109 to 120 “reflects the average size of government since 2010 and largely ends the practice of unpaid ministers”. He said that “as a result of the demands of modern government”, all governments since 2010 had consistently had larger ministerial teams than could be paid under the existing provisions of the 1975 act. This had led to “an unsatisfactory position in which governments of all parties have become dependent on ministers being willing and able to work unpaid”, and historically this had fallen predominantly on ministers in the Lords. Mr Thomas-Symonds said he did not think this was right, not least because Lords ministers “often manage some of the broadest and most demanding portfolios across government”. He suggested that all MPs would support ministers being paid for their work.

He explained that increasing the total number of ministerial salaries that could be paid to 120 while maintaining the limit of 95 ministers who could be MPs would mean that 25 salaries would effectively be reserved for Lords ministers. He said the objective of the bill was to avoid the situation where there were unpaid ministers.

Mr Thomas-Symonds said he hoped the bill would command support across the House, on the basis of a “general acceptance […] that anyone in the country should aspire to be a minister, no matter their background, without having to rely on personal wealth in lieu of a salary”.

Alex Burghart, shadow chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, agreed that those who serve as ministers ought to be paid. He said the Conservatives would not oppose the legislation.

Lisa Smart, Liberal Democrat spokesperson for the Cabinet Office, also agreed that ministers should be paid fairly for doing the job. Arguing that expanding the ministerial payroll was “only justifiable if it comes with transparency, accountability and a genuine commitment to public service”, she suggested the government should make commitments to prevent any salaried ministers holding outside jobs, enshrine the ministerial code in law and increase the powers of the government’s ethics advisor.

Several MPs questioned whether the bill would end the practice of appointing unpaid ministers. Sir Julian Lewis (Conservative MP for New Forest East) asked whether “if there is an increase in the number of paid ministerial posts, there will not be a commensurate increase in the number of unpaid ministerial posts”. Sir Oliver Dowden (Conservative MP for Hertsmere) suggested it might be preferable to legislate to make 120 a fixed cap on the number of ministers. Following these comments, Mr Burghart asked the government to make a commitment at the dispatch box that there would be no more unpaid ministers under the current government. He said this would reassure the House that there would not be “an ever-increasing problem” of unpaid ministers being appointed in addition to paid ministers.

The Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats also questioned whether as many as 120 ministers were needed. Mr Burghart said a future Conservative government would “in due course, reduce the number of ministers that the government require”. Ms Smart wondered whether Labour’s policy of English devolution could mean fewer ministers at a national level.

Responding to points about the overall number of ministers, Chris Ward, parliamentary secretary at the Cabinet Office, said the purpose of the bill was “not at all to increase the number of ministers or the size of the government”. Instead, he argued it was “simply to rectify the anomaly” of unpaid ministers in the House of Lords.

Both the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats also questioned how the government would use the newly salaried posts. Mr Burghart asked what the government intended to do with the additional secretary of state, and Ms Smart asked what responsibilities the additional ministers would take on. Mr Ward said while the bill allowed one additional secretary of state salary to be paid, it did not require it. He rejected the suggestion the government had any “prior intention” to create a new secretary of state. Similarly, he explained the bill did not necessarily create any additional ministerial roles, and the size of the current government remained unchanged.

Closing the debate for the Conservatives, shadow Cabinet Office minister Charlie Dewhirst said it should be noted that the impetus for the bill came from debates in the House of Lords on the House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill. He described that legislation as “misguided” and said it was “disappointing” the government had not supported Lord True’s amendment on unpaid ministers. However, he took “at least some comfort […] that this debate emerged from that bill”. Winding up for the government, Mr Ward said the bill addressed a “clear inequity” affecting members of the House of Lords taking on a ministerial role. He said the bill rectified the situation, “broadening the bench of those able to serve as ministers” and recognising that “private income should never be a requirement”.

4.2 Remaining stages

The bill was considered in a committee of the whole House straight after second reading. No amendments were tabled. Mr Thomas-Symonds briefly explained again the effect of the bill’s two clauses. Mr Burghart said he had not received the “crystal clear” dispatch box commitment he was looking for that the bill would mark an end to unpaid ministerial posts in the current government. Mr Thomas-Symonds replied that “ending the practice of unpaid ministers, which has largely been ended […] is exactly the intention of the bill”. The bill was reported without amendment and then received its third reading.

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Image by Jacob Diehl on Unsplash.