House of Commons of Canada
lower house of the Canadian Parliament
The House of Commons of Canada (French: Chambre des communes du Canada) is the lower house of the Parliament of Canada. Together with the Crown and the Senate of Canada, they comprise the bicameral legislature of Canada.
The House of Commons is a democratically elected body whose members are known as members of Parliament (MPs). The number of MPs is adjusted periodically in alignment with each decennial census. Since the 2025 federal election, the number of seats in the House of Commons has been 343.
Members are elected by simple plurality ("first-past-the-post" system) in each of the country's electoral districts, which are colloquially known as ridings. MPs may hold office until Parliament is dissolved and serve for constitutionally limited terms of up to five years after an election. Historically, however, terms have ended before their expiry and the sitting government has typically dissolved parliament within four years of an election according to a long-standing convention. In any case, an act of Parliament now limits each term to four years. Seats in the House of Commons are distributed roughly in proportion to the population of each province and territory.
The public source identifies “House of Commons of Canada” as lower house of the Canadian Parliament. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around House, Commons and Canada.
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Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q383590. VIAF identifies the subject as 146199824. The Library of Congress control number is n79142778. 3 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 2 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2025.
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This entry incorporates text from “House of Commons of Canada” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.