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Urgent questions

You can apply to the Speaker to be allowed to ask an urgent question in the Chamber.

Backbenchers (MPs who are not ministers) and shadow ministers can apply to the Speaker to ask an urgent question to a minister.

To be judged as ‘urgent’, a question should relate to a very recent or imminent event or development on which a minister may reasonably be expected to provide an answer that day. The matter raised in the question must be important in terms of public policy, and must have more than a local or temporary significance. Matters of current debate in the media don't automatically pass these tests.

The department provides a background briefing for the Speaker on the issue.

Contact an expert

Contact an expert

Table Office