At the beginning of each new session of Parliament the House elects from its members the speaker, who presides over and regulates debates and rules on points of order and members' conduct. The calling of members to speak in debate is entirely in the speaker's hands, and his main concern is to ensure that a variety of points of view is heard.
Sir Thomas Hungerford the first known speaker of the House of Commons
Edward III.- In 1376 the Good Parliament gave the first example of an attack by impeachment upon the royal ministers, the attack being countenanced by the Black Prince and the Mortimers, heirs to Lionel Duke of Clarence, and directed against the partisans of the Duke of Lancaster. Sir Peter de la Mare, spokesman (prolocutor) of the House of Commons on this occasion, is commonly called the first Speaker, but the title does not seem to have been used till 1377. The Proceedings are printed in the Rolls of Parliament, ii. 323, &c.
