Talk:Speaker (politics)

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[edit] The Speaker of the Sanate of Canada

If I may, perhaps it would be worth noting that the Speaker of the Canadian Senate is not a Speaker in the sense of the word used in this article; the Speaker in the Senate more closely resembles the Lord Chancellor, in that he or she is not elected but is rather appointed, and that he or she has the right to participate in partisan debate and vote according to his or her own convictions as opposed to established conventions; his or her decisions are not absolute and, rather, must be accepted by the Senate of Canada in order to be considered binding. Any thoughts? FiveParadox 06:17, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, the differences are fine and dandy, but none of those things are what defines a Speaker. The Speaker is the presiding officer, and the Speaker of the Canadian Senate is most definitely that. Keep in mind that it is only recently that the Speaker of the Canadian House of Commons was elected by secret ballot, and that their decisions became final. I think this article makes some assumptions that just aren't accurate. -unsigned comment

Adding to the earlier points raised by anon above, many other countries have speakers who participate in partisan debates and vote accordingly. E.g. NZ, Australia and US. In fact, I wonder if the UK is the odd one out in having a speaker who is supposed to be completely neutral. Of course, when it comes to the roles of speaker in most if not all cases the speaker AFAIK is expected/supposed to be neutral but in practice, there is frequent debate whether this actually occurs. The only thing I can think of that may be fairly unique with the Canada situation is that I expect in most cases (including NZ & Aus), decisions that are made by speakers are binding. (Of course, I'm only talking about 'speaker' decisions, clearly votes on laws etc are just votes) Nil Einne 20:41, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Merge

"Speakers of the House" is redundant to this page, and is not a disambiguation in that someone wanting a more specific page (EG. The Federal House's speaker) would look for them at "Speakers of the House". 68.39.174.238 04:03, 13 November 2006 (UTC)