Lammert used the first speech of his second term as Bundestag president to call for a host of improvements to the parliament's protocol, as well as a one-year extension to the legislative period.

Lammert pointed to statistics suggesting that German voters felt they had too many elections, and suggested holding general elections every five years, rather than every four.

Lammert, who was re-elected for this term with a slightly reduced majority of 84.6 percent, also called on representatives not to saddle the parliament with unnecessary work, and "self-critically check" the resolutions and initiatives they planned.

He encouraged parliamentarians to be more self-confident. "The Bundestag is not a support-organ, but the heart of the formation of our country's political will," he told representatives.

SPD relegated to the back

The seating arrangements in the new parliament did offer a startling image of how German politics changed in the September 27 vote.

Merkel's grand coalition partners in the last government, the Social Democrats (SPD), were devastated by the election, seeing their representation in the Bundestag drop from 221 deputies to 146.

This has forced the SPD to give up two of its highly-prized front row seats in the Bundestag, and leading figures in the grand coalition government, like former Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck, have now been relegated to the distant back rows.

On Wednesday, Lammert is to chair a meeting in which the Bundestag is to re-elect Chancellor Merkel at the head of new coalition government made up of her Christian Democrats and the liberal Free Democrats.

bk/AFP/dpa
Editor: Chuck Penfold