For the first time caller it can be a rather daunting business. You enter the Houses of Parliament via New Palace Yard and make your way towards Speaker’s Court. Upon reaching the imposing door of the Speaker’s House you wonder whether or not you should ring the bell on the not unreasonable grounds that there is a brass plaque bearing a rather bizarre piece of advice: "Do not Ring", the visitor is warned, "Unless an Answer is Required". By the time you have been led up the majestic Speaker’s Staircase, past stately portraits of bewigged grandees dating back to 1377, through the resplendent Gothic architecture of the Speaker’s Vestibule and into the Speaker’s Library - the chances are that you are positively trembling in your boots. This is worse than being summonsed to the headmistress’s office at school.

That is until you meet The Rt. Hon. Miss Betty Boothroyd MP herself, the first woman to hold the office of Speaker in its long and distinguished history. For through her warm and friendly manner she immediately puts you at ease and any lurking thoughts that you are about to be punished for having rung the wrong bell immediately disappear from your mind.

"It is all most magnificent here", Madam Speaker admits, "and sometimes I have to pinch myself to believe that all this is mine for a while. But I still like to think of myself as a small town north country girl at heart. I came out of the womb and into the Labour movement. And if there was one thing that my parents taught me whilst growing up in Yorkshire it was that no matter what happens to you, you should always keep your feet firmly on the ground."

It was on Monday 27^th April 1992 that the new House of Commons assembled to elect its 155^th Speaker. The occasion was unusual for a number of reasons. It was only the third time this century that the House was debating the merits of two nominees (thus forcing a division), the new Speaker was the first to be chosen from the Opposition benches since 1835 and, in choosing Betty Boothroyd, the former Tiller girl and colourful MP for the black country constituency of West Bromwich West the House was breaking with six centuries of tradition by electing a female. All of which means that she has been obliged to abandon a lifetime’s experience as a Labour Party activist in order to sit on an entirely impartial political perch. A perch upon which she might thus occasionally come to feel a little ill at ease?

"No, not at all", she replies. "When I was elected not only did I get the entire votes of my own Party, I also got the votes of almost 80 people in the Conservative Party, in addition to all the votes of the minority parties. With that vote of confidence it is my duty to remain utterly impartial. Nothing else will do."

He might well have been born over three centuries before her - but Betty Boothroyd is an ardent admirer of one particular predecessor - Speaker Lenthall, to be precise, and whose celebrated reply to Charles I she will quote to you with passion and glee. On 4^th January 1642 the King had entered the chamber of the House of Commons to arrest five Members of Parliament for treason. "May it please Your Majesty", Lenthall had fearlessly replied, "I have neither eyes to see, nor tongue to speak in this place, but as the House is pleased to direct me, whose servant I am". And that is precisely how Madam Speaker sees herself today, as nothing more than a servant of the House. Hardly surprising, then, that the slogan accompanying her own coat of arms should be "I Speak to Serve". In fact from the moment she graduated from Dewsbury’s Technical College and started working in a local shop called Bickers (and where she earned £1 a week as a bookkeeper) - and throughout her parliamentary career - including and especially in her current position as Speaker, Betty Boothroyd has provided an uninterrupted service. Firstly to her employers Bickers, latterly to the nation.

How does it feel, then, for a this particular Yorkshire lass, who proudly refers to her "’umble origins", to have risen through the ranks to one of the highest offices of the land?

"As a very great privilege indeed", she replies without the slightest pause for reflection. "That’s not to suggest that our institutions are perfect - of course they are not. But I am extremely proud to have been elected Speaker, you would hardly expect me to say otherwise, would you? My one regret is that my parents weren’t there to share the honour. My father died when I was barely 18 and my mother passed away before I was even Deputy Speaker. My mother never let me know that she was proud of me, mind you, although she would relate it to other people. I remember on one occasion when I was rather fraught at one count after a long and grueling election campaign. I thought I had lost my seat and was very distressed and in tears. And she just said ‘don’t worry dear, you are still my daughter, it’s all right.’ That’s the kind of comment that brings you back down to earth again and puts everything in persepctive."

In such august surroundings one is understandably more than a little reluctant to draw an analogy between overseeing the proceedings of the mother of Parliaments with the commercial activities of a large company. But is there not a a degree of common ground between them? After all, it is the responsibility of the Speaker to oversee each and every aspect of the business of the House.

"I wouldn’t know", she candidly admits. "Because I have never really worked in a big company. But I suppose that there is. After all the cost of running this establishment is in the region of £200 million a year and I do employ some 1500 men and women in six major departments - the Serjeant at Arms office, Clerks, Library, Hansard, Refreshment and Administration. This is overseen by the House of Commons Commission which I chair and which is in charge of the entire management of the Commons and to which the different Boards of Management from the various departments report on a regular basis. I have to confess, though, that it is this type of management structure which I find rather difficult and I still feel that I am somewhat on a learning curve. My view is that if you can handle all those facts and figures - then you can certainly deal with 650 or so rowdy MPs!"

Betty Boothroyd has won not just the love and admiration of the British public - she has won a host of prestigious prizes too - Parliamentarian of the Year, Communicator of the Year, Personality of the Year (to name but a few) and she has also acquired an impressive array of honorary Doctorates (Oxford and Cambridge included) - although she has currently put an embargo on accepting any more on the grounds that it might come to devalue those which she already holds. She is also particularly proud of being Chancellor of the Open University ‘the second best thing that has happened to me after being Speaker’. But has there not been a rather high price to pay for having notched up such a formidable range of achievements and accolades? Betty Boothroyd is the first to admit that there has.

My time is almost up. Those familiar tell tale signs are coming thick and fast. One last question - predictable enough - and one which Madam Speaker will doubtless have been asked many times before. How would Betty Boothroyd like to be remembered?

"As an honest and fair Speaker", she replies thoughtfully.

An epitaph with which even her sternest critics would surely be unable to take issue.