I just don't see it happening.
The government is looking into making ALL hereditary peerages gender neutral. Im not sure how committed they are to that considering what the pandemic, Brexit and potential independence or at least the struggle for independence of Scotland and possibly other parts of the union do to the economy. My guess is that there is more urgent stuff on people's agenda for the time being. But yes like in Spain the UK could see a change to a gender neutral succession but im assuming that is more something that might happen in 10 years time than in the next 2 years.
Do you think this might apply even to the dukedom of Fife? Not that it's in danger of extinction; but I've always thought it odd that the crown can be inherited by females, but high peerages cannot. To be sure, there have been occasional instances whereby Parliament or Letters Patent allowed a dukedom to be inherited by or through a female for one generation (e.g. Marlborough and Fife); there afterward, succession would revert to the male line.
If I understand correctly, once a high peerage becomes extinct (because the male line is extinct), it reverts to the crown. This presumably is what would have happened to the dukedom of Fife, had Alexandra and Maud, between them, failed to produce a single male heir to ensure the succession. As it was, it became a moot point, since both daughters of Princess Louise married; although each produced only one child, the said child was male.
Maud, however, didn't give birth to her only child until six years after marriage (she was 30 in 1923, an age when a woman is past the prime years of fertility). One presumes that everybody (especially her mother, husband, and father-in-law) was thrilled when in 1929, at the age of 36, she was delivered of a male heir -- important not only for the Fife succession but also, the earldom of Southesk.
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