Welcome to the french Senate

The Chamber

Debates are conducted by the President of the Sitting , who can be either the Speaker of the Senate or one of his six deputy speakers.

The President of the Commission represents the standing commission to whom the key issues of the bill have been referred.

A Senator chosen by his colleagues and known as the "rapporteur" states the position of the standing committee on the text under discussion.

The Secretaries of the Senate supervise the conduct of the ballots and the counting of votes

This illustration does not yet include the establishment of the environmentalist group on January 11, 2012.

Members of the political groups
	Union for a popular movement
	Unregistered Independents
	Centrist Party
	Democratic Social and European Party
	Socialist Party
	Communist Republicans and Citizens Party
	Environnementalist group
(Current composition)

The Government
	The minister representing the government takes part in the debate and answers questions put by Senators.
	The minister is assisted during the debate by members of his personal staff or civil servants .

The Senate's Civil Servants.
	The Secretary General of the Senate
	The president of the sitting is assisted by the Director General of the Senate’s Legislative Department or the Director of the Sittings Department.
	The Sittings Division is responsible for the organisation of the sitting including the president’s programme. The Legislative Division edits the text adopted by the Senate.
	The Director of the Summarised Minutes and the Secretaries of the Debates are responsible for making these documents available rapidly.
	The Director of the Complete Verbatim Minutes and Stenographers provides a complete account of the debate. The text is published in the Journal Officiel, the official French gazette. The note-takers work two minutes at a time. The revisers do stints of a quarter of an hour. The Secretary ensures that the senators can check the transcripts of their speeches before these are published.
	The clerks of the house assist the rapporteur and the president of the Standing Commission.
	The head usher’s staff are the only persons authorised to move between the benches during debates.