成人快手

Page 9 of 9

• 1. The debating chamber
• 2. Foundation
• 3. From ecclesiastical to secular
• 4. Balance of power
• 5. 'First Commoner'
• 6. Reform and re-form
• 7. A new chamber
• 8. Parliamentarians past
• 9. Rebuilt once more
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Rebuilt once more

The old Commons Chamber too was to find expression within the new palace. The design, by AWN Pugin and Charles Barry, consciously reflected the simplicity of the old Chamber in the predominance of undecorated oak, and kept the upper galleries and the rows of benches either side of Speaker's Chair as in the old Chamber.

The new House of Commons Chamber therefore formed part of a design history that stretched back via Sir Christopher Wren, to the reign of Edward III. But the creation of the Victorian Chamber was by no means the final chapter in the story of St Stephen's Chapel..

'... the limited space and seating ... was now seen as a virtue along with the confrontational layout.'

It was bombed in 1941, but Churchill insisted that the chamber should be 'restored in all its essentials to its old form, convenience and dignity'. He recognised that the intimacy of the old chamber had created an environment for lively and intense debate, whilst the rows of opposing benches had created the two-party system - in Churchill's eyes the bedrock of British parliamentary democracy.

Thus the limited space and seating - so often berated by Members in the past - was now seen as a virtue, along with the confrontation-inducingl layout. Indeed it had come to define the very nature of government and parliament. As Churchill succinctly observed, 'We shape our buildings and afterwards our buildings shape us'.

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Published: 2005-04-02