The honours system is the British state’s method of publicly recognising achievement and service. Around 2,000 honours are awarded each year, announced in two lists — at New Year and on the King’s official birthday in June.
The ranks
Most honours belong to the Order of the British Empire, created in 1917 to recognise civilian service in the First World War. Its five grades, from lowest to highest:
- MBE — Member. The most commonly awarded, typically for outstanding local or community achievement.
- OBE — Officer. For a distinguished national or regional contribution.
- CBE — Commander. For a prominent national role.
- KBE / DBE — Knight or Dame Commander. This is the level at which the title Sir or Dame comes with it.
- GBE — Knight or Dame Grand Cross. Very rare.
Separate orders exist for particular fields — the Order of the Bath for the armed forces and civil service, the Order of St Michael and St George for diplomacy — and the Order of Merit, limited to 24 living people and in the monarch’s personal gift, is the most exclusive of all.
How you get one
Anyone can nominate anyone, including online, and a substantial proportion of honours go to people entirely unknown outside their own town — hospice volunteers, scout leaders, lollipop ladies, people who have run a village hall for forty years. This is genuinely the largest part of each list, and it is the part the system defends itself with.
Nominations are assessed by committees of officials and independent members, and the final list is approved by the prime minister and the King.
The investiture
Recipients attend a ceremony at Buckingham Palace or Windsor, bringing up to three guests. Knights kneel on an investiture stool and are touched on each shoulder with a sword — the accolade — and everyone else receives their insignia and a few words of conversation. The King and other senior royals conduct them, and there are around twenty-five a year.
The name problem
“The Order of the British Empire” is an increasingly awkward title, and a growing number of recipients have said so publicly. Several have refused specifically on those grounds, most prominently the poet Benjamin Zephaniah, who wrote a piece explaining that the word “empire” reminded him of slavery and brutality.
Proposals to rename it — to the Order of British Excellence, among other suggestions — have been made repeatedly and have gone nowhere.
Refusals and forfeitures
Refusals are confidential, but a leaked Cabinet Office list in 2012 named around 300 people who had declined since 1951, including Roald Dahl, David Bowie, Aldous Huxley, Nigella Lawson and the painter L. S. Lowry, who turned down five separate honours.
Honours can also be forfeited for misconduct — as they were from Fred Goodwin after the collapse of RBS, and from Rolf Harris and Jimmy Savile’s estate following criminal convictions and revelations.
Not the same as a peerage
A knighthood is not hereditary and carries no seat in Parliament. A life peerage is a separate award that makes the recipient a Lord or Baroness and gives them a place in the House of Lords for life. The two are frequently confused, and the difference matters constitutionally.