Fifteen new Conservative peers will be appointed within days, according to a leaked list dominated by supporters of Boris Johnson and Brexit.
The former prime minister is set to trigger a fresh cronyism row with the post-exit reward for his backers, also ignoring a cross-party agreement to slim down the bloated House of Lords.
Paul Dacre, the former editor of the Daily Mail, will be made a Tory peer, the list says – Mr Johnson having failed to ease him into the post of chairman of Ofcom, the media regulator.
He will be joined by the businessman and major donor Michael Hintze, who has given the Tory party £4.7m according to the Electoral Commission database.
Andrew Roberts, the historian who has praised Mr Johnson, and Tony Sewell, the lead author of the controversial report that found no evidence of institutional racism in Britain will also get peerages.
Five former Tory MPs on also on the list, obtained by The Daily Telegraph: Stewart Jackson, Hugo Swire, Angie Bray, Graham Evans and Nicholas Soames.
Mr Jackson served as chief of staff to David Davis when he was Brexit secretary – but Sir Nicholas, Winston Churchill’s grandson, was stripped of the Tory whip by Mr Johnson for opposing a no-deal Brexit.
There are to be eight new Labour peerages, proposed by Keir Starmer, including former deputy leader Tom Watson, and Ruth Smeeth, a former MP who suffered antisemitic abuse.
Two senior union figures, the head of the Trades Union Congress Frances O’Grady and Dave Prentis, former general secretary of Unison, are also being sent to the Lords.
Mr Johnson was advised to boost Tory strength in the Lords to help him ram through controversial Brexit bills to tear up the Northern Ireland Protocol and for a bonfire of retained EU rules.
And the “political peerages” are likely to be followed by resignation honours, which the former prime minister has been planning – despite being forced out of No 10 by scandal.
They are tipped to include his key ally Nadine Dorries, the former culture secretary, and a second ultra-loyal minister Nigel Adams – which would hand Liz Truss the poisoned pill of perilous by-elections when her government is in crisis.
Arlene Foster, the former Democratic Unionist party first minister of Northern Ireland, is expected to become a non-affiliated peer.
Dominic Johnson, who set up the investment firm Somerset Capital Management with Jacob Rees-Mogg, the business secretary, has already been handed a peerage to become a trade minister.
Other Tories on the list include the director of the thinktank Politeia, Sheila Lawlor, and Ruth Lea, the economist and former civil servant.
Sharon Taylor, the leader of Stevenage council, Sonny Leong, the co-founder of SME for Labour, and Fiona Twycross, the London deputy mayor for fire and resilience, will be made Labour peers.
