Interesting article in the Telegraph
www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/05/20/first-trans-peer-step-closer-hereditary-candidate-claims-seat/
"Matilda Simon will contest the next by-election for one of the upper chamber’s 92 hereditary seats...
"...The House of Lords could shortly welcome its first trans peer and only female hereditary member.
Matilda Simon was this week given permission to contest the next by-election for one of the upper chamber’s remaining 92 hereditary seats.
If she wins, she will doubtless become the envy of peers’ daughters across the country, because the vast majority of titles may only be passed to a male heir.
However, because of a legal loophole, the candidate, born Matthew Simon in 1955, has inherited and retains the Barony of Wythenshawe, despite being in all other legal respects a woman...
"...Lady Simon winning a future by-election - which will take place upon the death or retirement of a hereditary member - would be likely to reignite the debate over the persistence of primogeniture among the aristocracy.
In 2013, in the aftermath of the marriage of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, Parliament passed a law to allow a first born child to inherit the throne, but this principle only applies to the Royal Family, not the peerage.
In recent years, Lord Balfour spoke of his anger that his Earldom would pass to his younger brother upon his death, rather than any of his daughters.
Indeed, he joked that a cunning ruse to ensure one of them succeeds would be if they transitioned to become a man.
However, according to a source close to the current process, that would not work, as the case of Lady Simon proves....
"...And in what the source close to the process described as an “irony”, she [Matilda Simon] has a sister born two years earlier.
“If the title had been inheritable by a woman, it would have gone to Margaret, the older sister, rather than the younger sister,” he said..."
Read the full article on the Telegraph website.