Belgian Chamber of Representatives - Members and Elections

Members and Elections

Article 62 of the Belgian Constitution fixes the number of seats in the Chamber of Representatives at 150. There are 11 electoral districts, which correspond with the Provinces, except in Flemish Brabant, which is divided into two electoral districts: Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde and Leuven. The number of seats for each electoral district is proportional to its population. All electoral districts have an electoral threshold of 5%, except for the electoral districts of Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde, Leuven and Walloon Brabant. The Court of Arbitration annulled the electoral threshold in those constituencies after a complaint by the Christian Democratic and Flemish, New Flemish Alliance and Flemish Interest parties.

There are 10 monolingual (5 Dutch and 5 French-speaking) electoral districts. Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde is the only bilingual electoral district as it encompasses both the 19 bilingual municipalities from the Brussels-Capital Region and the 35 Dutch-speaking municipalities of Halle-Vilvoorde in Flemish Brabant, including 7 municipalities with linguistic facilities for French-speaking inhabitants.

The seats are divided among the political parties using the D'Hondt method of proportional representation, which slightly favours large parties and coalitions.

The Representatives are divided into two so-called "language groups". Of the total of 150 Representatives, 88 are part of the Dutch language group, which consists of the Representatives from the Dutch language area, and 62 are part of the French language group, which consists of the Representatives from the French language area and the German language area. For the Representatives from Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde the language in which they take their oath as a Representative determines which language group they belong to. Following the 2007 federal election, the Chamber has a German-speaking member for the first time since 1999, Kattrin Jadin.

Nevertheless, because of the Belgian Constitution, both linguistic communities are granted equal powers in the Parliament. Although in general bills can be passed without a majority in both linguistic groups, bills relating to specific issues (so called 'community laws') can not and need the consent of both language groups.

The following table shows current distribution of seats between the language groups and the electoral districts. Since the latest election it has changed however (as part of the sixth Belgian state reform), with Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde and Leuven having been rearranged to Brussels and Flemish Brabant. This change was heavily contested by French-speaking Belgians, but was obliged by Arbitration Court, since the previous situation was deemed illegal in 2002 as unconstitutional.