DEREK Foster, who recently retired as Bishop Auckland MP after 26 years, has been elevated to the peerage.

Mr Foster, who admitted to once voting to scrap the House of Lords, was delighted to be among 16 Labour life peers created by Tony Blair, which will make his party the largest group in the Upper House for the first time.

He immediately pledged to keep fighting to close the North-South divide but admitted it would feel strange to don ermine robes, not least because he voted to abolish the Lords at the 1975 Labour Party conference.

"My father would not have believed it, as a staunch trade unionist, and neither would my mother, because she would not have thought her son could achieve it," he said. "But I'm very keen to get stuck into what I have been involved in for 30 years - the economic development of the North-East."

Mr Foster will join North-East colleagues Dr David Clark, the former MP for South Shields, ex-Jarrow MP Don Dixon and former Cabinet minister Dr Jack Cunningham in the Lords.

He will meet Lords authorities to discuss his title - Lord Foster of Bishop Auckland is thought to be favourite - before taking his seat in June.

Six Conservative and five Liberal Democrat peers were also announced.

* Vale of York MP Anne McIntosh has become a shadow minister for foreign affairs, under by shadow secretary of state, Dr Liam Fox. The new Tory team will have responsibility for foreign relations, particularly with the US and the European Union, plus global interests.

It has also taken on responsibility for international trade.

Miss McIntosh said: "Not only will international relations be high on the agenda, but the new responsibility for trade will be of great significance, not least for North Yorkshire and the Yorkshire region."

* Miss McIntosh wants Home Secretary, Charles Clarke, to take action to stop ball bearing guns being sold. She also wants a wide-reaching consultation into the gun's dangers to be carried out to enforce her case.

North Yorkshire police have also voiced concerns about the increased use of BB guns. Assistant chief constable, Peter Bagshaw, spoke of fears that armed police could mistake a BB gun for a real one.