French Senate
 |
The Senate amphitheater in the Luxembourg Palace |
The
Senate (French
Sénat) is the
upper house of the
Parliament of France.
A
Sénat was also the upper house during the
French Consulate of
1799-
1804.
Until September
2004, the French Senate had 321 senators who were elected for a 9-year term. After this date, the term was reduced to 6 years while the number of senators will progressively increase to 346 in
2010 to reflect changes in French demography.
Senators are
elected indirectly by approximately 150,000 local elected officials ("grands électeurs"), including mayors, city councillors, and deputies of the National Assembly. This system introduces a bias in the composition of the Senate, which favors rural areas. As a consequence, while the political majority changes frequently in the National Assembly, the Senate has remained
conservative since the foundation of the
Fifth Republic, and it is expected that it will remain so in the forthcoming years.
Following from a tradition started by the first French National Assembly during the French revolution, the "
left-wing" parties sit to the left as seen from the president's seat, and the "
right-wing" parties sit to the right, and the seating thus indicates the
political spectrum as represented in the Senate.
Senators elect among themselves a
President. The current incumbent is
Christian Poncelet. The President of the Senate is also, according to the constitution of the Fifth Republic, first in line of succession in case of death, resignation or impeachment (only for health reasons) of the
President of the Republic, thus becoming Acting President of the Republic until a new election can be held. This happened twice for
Alain Poher, once at the resignation of
Charles de Gaulle and once at the death of
Georges Pompidou.
According to the
French Constitution, the Senate has almost the same powers as the
National Assembly. Bills may be submitted by the government ("projets de loi") or by either house of Parliament ("propositions de loi"). Both houses must adopt the law before it can be promulgated.
Because both houses may amend the bill, it may take several readings to reach an agreement between the National Assembly and the Senate. When the Senate and the National Assembly cannot agree on a bill, the government can decide, after a complex procedure called
commission mixte paritaire, to give the final decision to the National Assembly, which majority is normally on the government's side. This does not happen frequently: most of the time both houses eventually agree on the bill, or the government decides to withdraw it. However, this power gives the National Assembly a prominent role in the law-making process.
The Senate also participates in controlling the government's action by publishing many reports every year on various topics.
An important power of the Senate relates to the position of its chairman. The French constitution provides that, in case of a vacancy of the presidency of the republic, the chairman of the Senate becomes the interim president until a new one is elected.
Because the Senate represents
rural areas in higher proportion than their importance in the French population, it has been criticized as an undemocratic institution; reform has been suggested.[
1] This is especially compounded by the Senate consistently having a right-wing majority, regardless of the alternation of parties in the presidency and the National Assembly. Former
Prime Minister Lionel Jospin denounced the Senate as an "anachronism".
The Senate is housed inside the
Palais du Luxembourg in the
6th arrondissement of
Paris and is guarded by
Republican Guards. In front of the building lie the Senate's garden, the
Jardin du Luxembourg, open to the public.
*
Politics of France*
Senator for life: France*
List of Presidents of the French Senate*
Official web site.
