Parliamentary Debate:

Two teams of two people One is called the Government, and the other is called the Opposition. One knows whether they're going to be Gov or Opp only when their round is posted at a tournament. In this event, the Judge(s) is/are referred to as the Speaker(s) (but to keep this guide as non-confusing as possible we will refer to them as both)

The person who gives Gov's first speech is called the Prime Minister, or PM. The person who gives Opp's first speech is called the Leader of Opposition or LO. The second speakers of each team are called the Member of Government (MG), and the Member of Opposition (MO) respectively.

Gov makes up the topic for debate in the round. Prior to the start of the round Opp has no idea what it's going to be

The topic has to be something that every college student knows enough to debate about off the top of their head If Opp feels that the topic is too specific/obscure/something only really informed people can know enough about they can declare it to be a Specific Knowledge or 'Spec' case during each of their 3 speeches, stating that the topic is not debatable because one needs specific knowledge to debate it. In most cases the Judge will give victory to Opp if such a statement is to be true. For example, the case "NASA should replace the current sealant used on the space shuttle with hypoxynucleotide- C4598" would be specific knowledge.

The topic can be any arguable statement. Examples: (The U.S. Military should be less involved in world affairs) or (an MIT scientist should debate a proponent of Intelligent Design) or (Batman is a better superhero than Superman) While describing the structure of a Parliamentary debate, we'll use the sample Topic “Batman is better than Superman”

Structure of Debate

Gov writes the topic on the board, and then the Opp can ask Points of Clarification (POCs). Opp uses these to understand the topic more.

PM gives the first speech that is 7 minutes with a 30 second grace period (so it's basically 7:30). This speech is referred to as the Prime Minister Constructive (PMC). It is the only pre-written speech given in round (Batman is better because blah blah blah...) While this speech is being told the LO is writing opp's first speech.

Opp's first speech is called the Leadership of Opposition's Constructive (LOC). This speech is 8 minutes with a 30 second grace period (8:30). This speech sets the mood of opp's argumentative method.

Here are the three most common methods of argumentation:

Refutation: Directly stating why the Gov's arguments are wrong and why the Opp's perspective is better. Most typical method of debate (“Superman is better because blah blah blah”)

Counter-argument: Instead of directly refuting Gov's argument, offer a second alternative or another option (“Instead of arguing that Superman is better, we're going to argue that there is no possible way to assign value to a living being and therefore Superman and Batman are of equal value in this world, just like the rest of us”)

Tight Call: If the Gov's argument is flawless and the Topic is unfair in the sense that it is undebatable the Opp can call the topic tight- call. This must be done at the beginning of the LOC, and then the entire Opp's argument becomes a debate of how nothing they could say would outweigh the Gov's superior arguments (“There's no way we could argue Superman over Batman because Superman is a bitch. While we could have argued that Superman has more physical abilities, Gov could easily crush our argument by saying that Batman makes more with the less he has and that is what makes him a better person... etc.)

If the Judge (Speaker) finds it to be true that none of Opp's arguments could have outweighed Gov's then they will award victory to Opp. A close-call completely flips the script on the entire debate, because now Gov has to present cases in negation of their original statement and prove how they could have been beaten. This can get very confusing.

Now the MG must give their speech which is 8 minutes with a 30 second grace period (8:30).

Then the MO gives their 8 minute 30 second speech...

And then the LO gives the rebuttal speech And then the LO gives the rebuttal speech. In this speech they can not introduce any new arguments, they can only go over what was argue and combat their opponents' arguments. This speech is 4 minutes with a 30 second grace period (4:30)

Then the PM gives their 5 minutes rebuttal with a 30 second grace period (5:30) Again, no new points can be made in either of the rebuttal speeches.

And then that's the end of the debate. Again here is the time frame: PMC – 7:30 LOC – 8:30 MG – 8:30 MO – 8:30 LOR – 4:30 PMR – 5:30 The total time for a round of Parliamentary debate is 43 minutes, not including the few seconds in between each speech.

Extra Rules

POIs Throughout the first four speeches members of the opposing team can stand up and ask a Point of Information (POI) if the person speaking allows them to ask it. They can do this for clarification, crossfire, or to ask a question simply to throw the person speaking off. (This is the only form of crossfire in Parliamentary debate)

Points of Order A point of order is raised when a competitor believes that one of the rules of debate is being broken. The two circumstances when someone can raise a Point of Order is if When a debater extends their grace period (Speech is over 8:30 or whatever the time is When a debater introduces new information in their rebuttal speech

The debater rises from his or her seat and says "Point of Order." The debater who is speaking stops their speech. The debater who rose on the point indicates what rules violation they are raising the point on by saying "the speaker is overtime" or "the speaker just made the new argument _____ which is new in rebuttal." The speaker of the round (judge) will rule the point "Well Taken" or "Not Well Taken."

A well taken point means that the speaker must conclude their speech if they are over time or that the new point will not be considered as it was offered during a rebuttal. A not well taken point means that the speaker disagrees with the point and will allow the debater to go on speaking or will consider the argument as not being new. The speaker, not the debater who is speaking, may also rule the point "under consideration," which means that the speaker will determine whether the point is true at a later time. "Under consideration" only applies to new arguments in rebuttal, not to time limits.

A debater can also stand up and say “Point of Personal Privilege” when their competitor hurts their feelings or when an emergency comes up. The same rules of “Point well taken” or “Point not well taken” apply