Speaker’s Chair

A carved oak Speaker’s Chair, being a replica of the Speaker’s Chair by Pugin in the House of Commons, Westminster; the carved canopy with a pierced gallery and four carved pillars and a Royal armorial at the centre; the front section with carved panelling of scrolling leaf floral decoration; the centre panel with crossed mace decoration, the front inset with a wing back armchair, upholstered in green leather; the back with 10 carved panels, raised on a stepped platform with later added desk. The Chair incorporates a small amount of timber from both Westminster Hall and Nelson’s flagship, HMS Victory, which saw service in the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. Inscription carved into the front of the platform: “Replica of the Speaker’s Chair in the House of Commons at Westminster, presented to the House of Representatives at Canberra by the United Kingdom Branch of the Empire Parliamentary Association, comprising Members of both Houses of Parliament, as a fitting symbol of the great Parliamentary tradition which binds together the free Nations of the British Commonwealth. Anno Domini 1926.”

The chair represents the ties between England and Australia and reflects a history of continuity through the inherited Westminster system of Parliament. In 1926 Sir Littleton Groom, the first Speaker in the Provisional Parliament House, stated the chair stood for ‘the authority, honour, and dignity of Parliament… it will inspire feelings of affection, esteem, and gratitude towards the land that gave birth to Parliamentary institutions’. This relationship was reinforced when the Speaker’s Chair in the British House of Commons was destroyed during an air raid in 1941. The Australian government paid for a replica of the Speaker’s Chair at the Provisional Parliament House and presented it to the British House of Commons in 1951. It was carved by British craftsmen out of black bean and had ‘The Gift of Australia’ inscribed across the back