House of Representatives (Australia) | House Representatives (Australia)

House Of Representatives (Australia)

Australia

This article is part of the series: Politics and government of Australia
Constitution Constitution Statute of Westminster Australia Act
Monarchy Monarch Queen Elizabeth II Queen's Representative and Governor General Quentin Bryce
Government Prime Minister Julia Gillard Deputy Prime Minister Wayne Swan Cabinet 67th Ministry Federal Executive Council
Legislature Parliament Senate President John Hogg House of Representatives Speaker Anna Burke Opposition Leader Tony Abbott Opposition Shadow Cabinet
Judiciary High Court Lower Courts Chief Justice Robert French
Elections Federal Electoral System Electoral divisions 2010 Federal election Political parties Federal By-elections
States/territories Governors and Administrators Premiers and Chief Ministers New South Wales Victoria Queensland Western Australia South Austalia Tasmania Capital Territory Legislative Assembly Northern Territory Parliaments and Assemblies State electoral systems
Local government New South Wales Victoria Queensland Western Australia South Australia Tasmania Northern Territory
Other issues Defence Force Regions Foreign relations Public holidays
Other countries Atlas Politics portal

The House of Representatives is one of the two houses (chambers) of the Parliament of Australia; it is the lower house; the upper house is the Senate. Members of Parliament (MPs) serve for terms of approximately three years.

The present Parliament, as elected at the 2010 election, is the 43rd Federal Parliament since Federation. It is the first hung parliament in the House of Representatives since the 1940 election, with Labor and the Coalition winning 72 seats each of 150 total. Six crossbenchers hold the balance of power: Greens MP Adam Bandt and independent MPs Andrew Wilkie, Rob Oakeshott and Tony Windsor declared their support for Labor on confidence and supply, independent MP Bob Katter and National Party of Western Australia MP Tony Crook declared their support for the Coalition on confidence and supply. The resulting 76–74 margin entitled Labor to form a minority government. The Labor government increased their parliamentary majority on 24 November 2011 from 75–74 to 76–73 when the Coalition's Peter Slipper became Speaker of the Australian House of Representatives, replacing Labor's Harry Jenkins. In the Senate, where no party tends to have a majority of seats, the Greens gained the sole balance of power, previously holding a shared balance of power with the Family First Party and independent Nick Xenophon.

Read more about House Of Representatives (Australia): Origins and Role, Federation Chamber, The Composition of The House, Primary, TPP and Seat Results Since 1937

Famous quotes containing the word house:

“For my father, who used to sit, hour after hour, night after night, outside our house in Africa, watching the stars “Well,” he would say, “if we blow ourselves up, there’s plenty more where we came from!””
—Doris Lessing (b. 1919)