FORMER Swindon North MP Michael Wills is to be made a life peer, Downing Street has announced.

Mr Wills, who was an MP for 13 years in the town before standing down ahead of the recent election, was included on the dissolution list for the Labour Party and will take a seat in the House of Lords.

The former minister said he was looking forward to the chance to continue in public service in a different way.

He said: “I’m glad that I will be able to carry on in some form in public life.

“I felt that my time as an MP had come to an end and I didn’t want to carry on any longer, but public service has always been very important to me, so I am glad to have the opportunity to carry on in that role.”

“I hope that in some part it’s a reflection of my work as minister and also what I was able to achieve in the town.

“I’ve had that experience of representing a town like Swindon, which is very important in our public life, and the town will still have that voice in the House of Lords.”

But he said he was still unsure of what he will now be known as – the traditional form would be Lord Wills of Swindon, but as there is already a peer from Swindon, Lord Stoddart of Swindon, it is unclear whether this would be possible.

“I haven’t even began to think about that,” he said.

“There are lots of rules and regulations about these things.

“People normally take places with which they have had a connection and after 13 years of pretty intense engagement in Swindon if I can find a way to recognise that, I will.”

Altogether 56 new members of the Lords are being created, including former deputy prime minister John Prescott and former Conservative Party leader Michael Howard.

Downing Street released two lists of new peers – a list of working peers, featuring people joining the list from outside parliament, and a dissolution list, featuring former MPs.

It is traditional to publish a dissolution list after an election. In total, there are 29 new Labour peers, 16 new Tory peers and nine new Lib Dem peers.

Once all the new peers have taken their seats, Labour will have 239 seats in the Lords, the Conservatives 210 and the Liberal Democrats 80.