Federal Assembly (Switzerland)

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Federal Assembly Bundesversammlung (German) Assemblée fédérale (French) Assemblea federale (Italian) Assamblea federala (Romansh)
Type
Type	Bicameral
Houses	Council of States National Council
Leadership
President of the National Council	Eric Nussbaumer, SP/PS
President of the Council of States	Eva Herzog, SP/PS
Structure
Seats	246 46 Council of States 200 National Council
National Council political groups	SVP/UDC 62   SP/PS 41   The Centre 29   FDP/PLR 28   Greens 23   GLP/PVL 10   EvP/PEV 2   EDU/UDF 2   MCG 2   LT 1
Council of States political groups	The Centre 15   FDP/PLR 11   SP/PS 9   SVP/UDC 6   Greens 3   GLP/PVL 1   MCG 1
Elections
Last National Council election	22 October 2023
Last Council of States election	October-November 2023
Meeting place
Federal Palace of Switzerland, Bern
Website
www.parliament.ch

The Federal Assembly^[1] is the federal bicameral parliament^[2] of Switzerland. It comprises the 200-seat National Council and the 46-seat Council of States. It meets in Bern in the Federal Palace.

The houses have identical powers. Members of both houses represent the cantons, but, whereas seats in the National Council are distributed in proportion to population, each canton has two seats in the Council of States, except the six 'half-cantons', which have one seat each. Both are elected in full once every four years, with the last election being held in 2023.

The Federal Assembly possesses the federal government's legislative power, along with the separate constitutional right of citizen's initiative. For a law to pass, it must be passed by both houses. The two houses may come together as a United Federal Assembly in certain circumstances, such as to elect the Federal Council (the head of government and state), the Federal Chancellor, the federal judges or (only in times of great national danger) a general.