Charlotte Owen, former adviser to Boris Johnson, made youngest peer at 30

A former adviser to Boris Johnson has turn into the youngest member of the House of Lords on the age of 30.

Charlotte Owen was nominated to parliament’s higher chamber by Mr Johnson following his resignation as prime minister final yr.

The adviser will now be generally known as Baroness Owen of Alderley Edge and sit as a Conservative peer.

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She joins one other Johnson ally, Ross Kempsell – now Lord Kempsell – in coming into the Lords. He joined the House final week on the age of 31.

In a scathing report launched final week, the committee which advises the House of Lords on methods to cut back its membership criticised Mr Johnson for the variety of individuals he ennobled.

The Lord Speaker’s committee on the scale of the House highlighted Mr Johnson as exhibiting “no interest” in making an attempt to cut back the variety of friends.

According to a biography issued by the House of Lords, Lady Owen graduated from the University of York in 2015, earlier than occurring to work as an adviser to Conservative MPs Sir Alok Sharma, Mr Johnson, and Sir Jake Berry.

She additionally labored for Mr Johnson in Downing Street, in addition to Liz Truss. Lady Owen additionally labored for Chris Heaton-Harris when he was chief whip in early 2022.

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Lord Kempsell was beforehand a political director of the Conservative Party and has additionally labored carefully alongside Mr Johnson for a number of years.

The Tory mayor of the Tees Valley Combined Authority, 36-year-old Ben Houchen, joined the Lords alongside Lady Owen.

Shaun Bailey – now Lord Bailey – joined the higher chamber final week. There had been criticism of his peerage as his employees took half in a lockdown-breaking Christmas occasion at Conservative Party headquarters in December 2020.

The Lords in 2017 set an intention to cut back the variety of friends to round 600 – however it stays above 800.

Last week’s report famous that “progress” was being made to shrink the House till Mr Johnson took over and elevated the variety of appointments.

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He drew criticism on quite a few events for his method to the Lords, together with appointing Lord Lebedev, the son of a former KGB agent, and Lord Cruddas, a Tory donor, regardless of being informed by the House of Lords Appointments Commission (Holac) it couldn’t help giving him a seat.

More than half of Mr Johnson’s peerage nominations weren’t accepted by Holac – together with Nadine Dorries and Nigel Adams.