President of the Chamber of Deputies of the Sixteenth Parliament (from 29 April 2008 to 14 March 2013). First elected to the Chamber of Deputies in 1983, he was elected several more times, remaining a Member until the Sixteenth Parliament. He was elected a Member of the European Parliament in 1989 and again in 1994. He was Deputy President of Council of Ministers (Deputy Prime Minister) in the second and third Berlusconi governments. In January 2002, he became the Italian representative to the European Convention set up to draft the Constitutional Treaty of Europe, and, from November 2004 to May 2006, held the post of Minister of FoKingdom Affairs.