Father of the House
Recently, the title Mother of the House or Mother of Parliament has also been used, although the usage varies among countries; it is either the female alternative to Father of the House, being applied when the relevant member is a woman, or refers to the oldest or longest-serving woman without reference to male members.
[1][2] If two or more members have the same length of current uninterrupted service, then whoever was sworn in earlier, as listed in Hansard, is named as Father of the House.
[1] In 2017, Harriet Harman was described as "Mother of the House" by Prime Minister Theresa May, in recognition of her status as the longest-continuously serving woman MP.
[4] During speeches at the re-opening of Parliament after the 2024 General Election, Diane Abbott was also described as the "Mother of the House" by Prime Minister Keir Starmer, and then Leader of the Opposition Rishi Sunak.
[14][15] The Northern Ireland Assembly also grants the title of Father of the House to its longest serving male member.
[24] Starting with the Frankfurter Nationalversammlung (Frankfurt Parliament) of 1848, and based on older regional traditions, basically all German nation-wide, state-level and lower parliaments had a father of the House at the start of each legislative period, usually called Alterspräsident (President by right of age).
This elder statesman steps forward to break the tie among equal members, to open the proceedings and to arrange the very first self-organizing election without external help from e.g. parliament employees.
This tradition was continued from the North German Confederation into the 1871 German Empire (also known as Weimar Republic after 1918) and, after being discontinued in Nazi Germany, was resumed in 1949 by the present Parliament (Bundestag) in the Federal Republic until it was discontinued again before the 2017 German federal election to prevent any member of the upcoming Alternative for Germany (AfD), or any other new party, as the position was changed to refer to the longest sitting member.
In addition, the factions appoint members for the Ältestenrat, the Council of Elders of the Bundestag, which organizes the parliament work behind the scenes.
As the Alterspräsident's opening speech usually draws a certain amount of public attention, the position has recently attracted controversy, when after German Reunification the Party of Democratic Socialism (the successor of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany which had ruled communist East Germany) obtained the position by including aged independents (writer Stefan Heym in 1994, Fred Gebhardt in 1998) in their party lists.
Before the open session, the senior chairperson and junior notaries review the mandates of all the elected MPs in addition to their own.
He was also the oldest MP between 2008 and 2018 (then-age 81), when former Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad was reelected to the Dewan Rakyat at the age of 92.
Since 2022, Tan Kok Wai is now the "Father of the House", having served as MP continuously since 1986, firstly for Sungai Besi (1986–1995) and now Cheras (1995–present).
Traditionally when a new Russian parliament is formed the eldest deputy opens and manages the first session until a chairman is elected.
Until his death on 23 March 2015, former Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew was the longest-serving Member of Parliament (Tanjong Pagar) and thus the Father of the House.
[31] Upon Goh's retirement in 2020, Senior Minister Lee Hsien Loong is Father of the House having served since 1984.
In Sweden, the Riksdagsordningen [sv] law states that the member of the Riksdag who has held their elected seat for the longest shall be the Ålderspresident which translates to President by age.
Members of the Riksdag who has held the position of Ålderspresident since the abolition of bicameralism: According to article 82 of the Constitution of Ukraine, the oldest deputy opens the first session of each new convocation of the Verkhovna Rada.
