Political party whip

The party whip is a member of parliament who is chosen by their squad to be the team manager. This fact sheet explores their role within the party and in the Senate and House of Representatives, and how they got their name.

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    Party whips counting the votes in a partitioning in the Senate.

    DPS Auspic

Part

Each parliamentary party has whips who work in the Senate or the Firm of Representatives. The whip's role is then various and busy that the major parties have a chief whip and 2 deputy whips. They accept several responsibilities, including:

  • meeting with the whips of opposing parties to programme the parliamentary mean solar day, fix the agenda and sort out procedural details
  • organising a listing of political party members who wish to speak on bills and other business concern and giving this to the President of the Senate or Speaker of the House of Representatives
  • making sure that all party members attend and vote as a team in a division
  • counting and recording the votes in a segmentation
  • providing advice and support for party members
  • ensuring that party decisions are carried out
  • negotiating 'pairs' from opposing parties, so that numbers between the government and opposition are kept in balance if members of parliament are absent.

In the Senate and House of Representatives

In the House of Representatives, whips sit down in the back row behind their party. In the Senate, whips sit amidst their political party and towards the President. In both cases, the whips are given seats so they can see who is present and what is happening amidst party members.

Whips are quite visible as they move effectually speaking to colleagues, organising the business of the party and making decisions with opposing political party whips, the Clerks, the President or the Speaker.

History

The term 'whip' comes from the sport of play a joke on-hunting in England. The whipper-in was the person who whipped all the hunting hounds into a pack, pointed them in the right direction to chase the fob and ensured that the pack did not stray. The employ of the term 'whip' may date back as far equally the seventeenth century in the British Parliament.

Political party whips counting the votes in a division in the Senate.

A woman and a man stand on either side of the Clerk's table in the Senate. There are people sitting at the central table.

DPS Auspic

Description

A woman and a man stand on either side of the Clerk's tabular array in the Senate. In that location are people sitting at the primal table.

Copyright data

Permission should be sought from DPS AUSPIC for third-party or commercial uses of this image. To contact DPS AUSPIC e-mail: auspic@aph.gov.au or phone: 02 6277 3342.