Speaker of the House of Commons (United Kingdom) and 2005. At the 2010 general election, Speaker John Bercow faced ten opponents, including Nigel Farage, former leader of UKIP, who obtained 17.4% of the vote, and John Stevens, from the Buckinghamshire Campaign for Democracy party, who obtained 21.4%. Bercow won with 47% of the vote. The Speaker's primary function is to preside over the House of Commons. Traditionally, the Speaker when presiding wore court dress—a black coat with white shirt and bands, beneath a black gown, with stockings and buckled shoes, and a full-bottomed wig. But in 1992 Betty Boothroyd, the first female Speaker, eschewed the wig. Her successor,
Speaker of the Irish House of Commons Speaker of the Irish House of Commons The Speaker of the Irish House of Commons was the presiding officer of the Irish House of Commons until its disestablishment in 1800. In the absence of a government chosen from and answerable to the Commons, the Speaker was the dominant political figure in the Parliament of Ireland. Unlike in modern British and Irish parliamentary practice, the Speaker was not expected to be politically impartial and several Speakers held government or Crown-appointed positions while also presiding over the Commons. Even so, the conduct of everyday business in the House was generally overseen with