Chamber of Deputies (Romania)

The Chamber of Deputies (Camera Deputaților) is the lower house in Romania's bicameral parliament. It has 412 seats, to which deputies are elected by direct popular vote in single-member electoral districts using mixed member proportional representation. Additionally, the organisation of each national minority is entitled to a seat in the Chamber (under the limitation that a national minority is to be represented by one organisation only).

Presidents of the Chamber of Deputies
The Standing Bureau of the Chamber of Deputies consists of the President of the Chamber of Deputies, four vice-presidents, four secretaries, and four quaestors. The President of the Standing Bureau also serves as the President of the Chamber of Deputies. The President is elected, by secret ballot, for the duration of the legislative period. All the other members are elected at the beginning of each parliamentary session.

The political stance of presidents of the lower house after the development of a modern party system is given by:

Interim (acting) officeholders are denoted by italics. The Rule of the Chamber of Deputies states that at the first standing of the house, the meeting is headed by the eldest senator and helped by the youngest senator. Those bear the title of Interim President of the Senate, and, as their term is very short (one or two days) are not listed. The interim officeholders listed have hold the office in different circumstances and for a longer time.

Standing Bureau
The (Biroul Permanent) is the body elected by the deputies that rules the Chamber. Its President id the President of the Chamber, and s/he is elected for a whole legislature (usually four years). All the other members are elected at the beginning of each parliamentary session.

There is one President, and four of each: Vicepresidents, Quaestors and Secretaries. The current composition is listed below.

Committees of the Chamber
Permanent committees and current leadership are listed below.

2004–2008
In Romania's 2004 legislative election, held on 28 November, no party won an outright majority. The Social Democratic Party (PSD) won the largest number of seats but is currently in opposition because the Justice and Truth Alliance, the Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania, the Romanian Humanist Party(which later became the Conservative Party), and the National Minorities formed a governing coalition, giving it 177 seats in the Chamber of Deputies (47.9% of the total). The Conservative Party withdrew in December 2006, meaning that the government lost the majority in the Chamber of Deputies. In April 2007 the liberal prime-minister, Călin Popescu-Tăriceanu, dismissed the Democratic Party ministers from the government and formed a minority government with the Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania, marking the end of the Justice and Truth Alliance.

During the 2004–2008 legislature, the president of the Chamber of Deputies was Bogdan Olteanu from the National Liberal Party, who was elected on 20 March 2006, after the Chamber's former president, Adrian Năstase, was forced by his own party (the Social Democratic Party, PSD) to step down amidst allegations of corruption.

After the 2004 elections, several deputies from the PSD switched to other parties (including the governing Justice and Truth Alliance) or became independents, with the total number of PSD seats being reduced from 113 to 105. The number of Justice and Truth Alliance deputies also increased from 112 to 118, making it the largest formation in parliament as of October 2006. This changed again in December 2006, leaving the PSD with 107 seats and the Justice and Truth Alliance with 101. Since April 2007 the Justice and Truth Alliance has split leaving the two former members with 51 respectively 50 members. Deputies elected to the European Parliament in the 2007 election resigned, thus reducing the number of deputies to 314 as of 4 December 2007.

A new election was held in 2008. The table below gives the state of play before the 2008 election; parties in bold were part of the governing coalition. That coalition was tacitly supported by the PSD.

2000–2004
Elections to the Chamber of Deputies were held on 26 November 2000, in which the Social Democratic Party of Romania (PSD) won plurality. The governing majority was formed from the PSD and the Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR), which, with 182 members, made up 54.8% of seats. The president of the Chamber of Deputies during this period was Valer Dorneanu, who was elected on 15 December 2000. The distribution of seats was as follows:

A list of chamber candidates for the year 2012 can be found here