DAVID Cameron was last night accused of giving the public an “expensive insult” after unveiling dozens of new peers, including former ministers and advisers, in the dissolution honours list.

Downing Street announced 26 names proposed by the Prime Minister, with 11 nominated by the LibDems and eight by Labour, making 45 new Lords in total and increasing the upper chamber’s membership to more than 800.

Names on the list include ex-Labour chancellor Alistair Darling, who led last year’s Better Together campaign, Scots businesswoman and Tory supporter Michelle Mone, recently unveiled as the government’s business start-up Tsar, and former LibDem leader Sir Menzies Campbell.

LibDem former chief secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander and ex-business secretary Vince Cable get knighthoods, after apparently turning down the chance to go to the upper chamber.

Katie Ghose, chief executive of the Electoral Reform Society, said the new peers would cost the taxpayer at least an extra £1.2 million a year.

“At a time when the government is talking about reducing the cost of politics, this announcement is an expensive insult to the public,” she said.

“Today’s further expansion of the Lords – part of the constant arms race to pack the chamber with loyalists, whichever party is in power – shows the system is well and truly bust. The rapid growth in size and cost of our upper chamber is a national scandal, and the sooner we sort out this mess the better.”

The SNP, which refuses to sit in the Lords, condemned the appointments as an “affront to democracy” and said the list was one of “rejected and retired politicians – cronies and hangers-on with big cheque books”.

“David Cameron has now added another 45 lords and ladies to govern us at massive cost and with absolutely no democratic accountability,” said Kirsty Blackman MP, SNP Spokesperson on the House of Lords.

“Instead, Westminster should be looking at the abolition of the whole chamber and the creation of a fit-for-purpose 21st-century democratic house.

“The current House of Lords is beyond reform and must now be cleared out and reconstituted on firm democratic principles.

“This is a sorry list of rejected and retired party politicians – cronies and hangers-on with big cheque books.”

She added: “It is an affront to democracy that politicians whose parties have been roundly rejected by the electorate can then reappear in parliament a few weeks later and legislate for the rest of their lives without ever having to be accountable again. That is the scandal of today’s list. It will come as no surprise that the Better Together campaign frontman gets his reward with the elevation of Alistair – now Lord – Darling for his support for the Tory led campaign.”

Former foreign secretary William Hague and Cameron’s long-standing gatekeeper Kate Fall were also given peerages.

Former ministers who served under Cameron featured heavily on the Conservative list, with ex-health secretary Andrew Lansley, Sir George Young, David Willetts and Greg Barker joining Hague in the Lords. Tory grandee Douglas Hogg, who came under fire during the expenses scandal after it emerged he had filed a claim for cleaning the moat at his country home, is also on the list.

The LibDem peerages list, put forward by former deputy prime minister Nick Clegg, is dominated by MPs who either stood down or lost their seats in the General Election in May.

Labour’s peerage nominations, made by former party leader Ed Miliband, included former Cabinet ministers David Blunkett, Peter Hain, Dame Tessa Jowell and Paul Murphy.