Gerhard Köstner - Englische Rhetorik im Konferenzsaal

Only one person should speak at a time.

Please do not interrupt each other.(Reden Sie nicht durcheinander)

Please take your conversations off the floor.(private Gespräche außerhalb des Raumes …)

Please avoid side conversations which distract other participants.

Please don´t carry on a conversation with your neighbour while someone is speaking.

I shall have to call you to order, Mr Jackson.(zur Ordnung rufen)

You are disrupting the meeting.(stören)

I will not entertain dilatory, absurd or frivolous motions.

(Verzögerungsanträge, absurde und unseriöse Anträge.)

We must avoid splintering of the group.(Aufsplitterung vermeiden)

With all due respect, I must urge you not to hinder business by constantly raising points of order.(Anträge zur Geschäftsordnung stellen)

You should not use parliamentary forms merely to obstruct business.

I must ask you to avoid witticisms at the expense of others.(Witzeleien auf Kosten anderer)

The House / meeting / will be in order. The gentleman may continue.

Der Vorsitzende muss sicherstellen, dass Beiträge kurz und sachlich gestaltet werden, damit eine Konferenz effizient und termingerecht verlaufen kann. Diskussionsbeiträge und Kommentare sollen stets über den Vorsitz und nicht zwischen einzelnen Teilnehmern ausgetauscht werden.

Please keep to the agenda and make sure that all discussion is relevant and to the point.(sachbezogen)

A good speech should have a good beginning and a good ending, and they should be as close together as possible.

Your statements should therefore be brief and to the point.(kurz und bündig / sachlich)

In order to have any chance of finishing on time, brevity will be of the essence.(sich kurz fassen)

If we want this conference to go beyond rhetoric, …(… nicht nur geredet wird)

You / It is you who / will determine whether or not this conference goes beyond rhetoric.

All comments and remarks should be addressed to the Chair so that all attendees can participate in an argument.(… an den Vorsitz richten)

All remarks should be addressed through the Chair.

I encourage all attendees to contribute to the discussions.

I encourage you to express your opinions.

So much time is saved and so much more business can be conducted when we follow the rules of procedure.(Geschäftsordnung einhalten)

Order. I should inform members that thirty back-benchers (Hinterbänkler) are seeking to take part in the debate this afternoon. I hope that it will not be necessary to have time limits, but I ask each member to consider speaking only for eight minutes approximately, or ten minutes maximum. If any member speaks for too long, it will subsequently be necessary to have a time limit which could be quite severe on the last few speakers. Therefore, if members watched the clock, that would help enormously.

AntwortThank you, Madam Speaker. I will do my best to comply with your instructions.

Order. I am loathe to interrupt the honourable gentleman. He is making an extremely interesting speech which I am listening to with respect. He said that the debate needed to happen and I just want to, very politely, make the point that six other honorable members who will have a lot less time than the honorable gentleman are waiting to speak. Therefore, I feel confident in predicting that his last sentence is coming.(Zitat aus dem britischen Unterhaus und Beispiel für den „feinen englischen Humor“).

Order. The gentleman spoke for 31 minutes and very long interventions will not help those members who want to speak.

AntwortI shall try to be more concise in the remainder of my speech, Mr Speaker.

The speaker will please continue.

Some latitude has been allowed and I will continue to allow a little bit of elasticity.(Spielraum, Freiraum)

We shall have to keep each contribution to 15 minutes. Otherwise, we´ll never get through.

We may have to set a time limit. Our speeches are getting too long.

We should assign a time limit to each agenda item.

I remind you that there is a 7-minute speaking limit.(Redezeitbegrenzung)

Order.(zur Ordnung) There is a six-minute time limit.

Order. Rather than imposing a time limit, I suggest that the members keep their speeches to about ten minutes.

As time is so limited, I will keep my comments on Europe for another time.

It is an outrage that we have only 20 minutes left for speeches on a matter as important as this.(Es ist eine Schande …)

There is not sufficient time to do justice to the problems and issues at hand.(gerecht werden)

Speaker: I have only ten minutes and hardly know where to begin. – Voice in back : Why don´t you begin at the ninth!

Mr Timewell, your time is up.

I think it might be a good idea if we focused our attention on…

Close attention must be paid to …

Let me focus on the issue of …

We must focus on the key issues.

In our discussion we should concentrate on the main topic of this meeting.

Enough has been said of …

I think we´ve spent enough time on this topic.

We´ve spent too long on this issue, so we´ll leave it for now.

I think that covers this topic.

Well, that's about it for now. We've covered most of what we wanted to present.

There is not much point in discussing the matter any further.

I suggest leaving this issue aside for the moment.

I think we need to deal with other issues first.

I´ll deal with this issue later, if I may, but for now let me …

Der Vorsitzende stellt fest, dass sich die Besprechung bzw. der Redner vom Thema entfernt …

We are getting off the subject.(vom Thema abkommen)

We have got off the track.

The meeting is going off-track.

We're getting a little sidetracked here.

I think we´re steering / getting / off topic a bit with this discussion.

That’s a very good point, but it’s not on topic.(… gehört nicht zum Thema)

Let´s try to stay on topic.(beim Thema bleiben)

I am afraid we are moving too far away from the subject.(zu weit vom Thema entfernen)

I am afraid we are losing / we´re beginning to lose / sight of the main point of our conference.(aus den Augen verlieren)

You are wandering away from the subject.(Sie entfernen sich vom Thema)

I´m afraid we´ve strayed from the matter at hand.(von der Tagesordnung abschweifen)

Straying away from the topic only robs time from what we intend to accomplish.

… und der zur Sprache gebrachte Punkt oder die laufende Diskussion nicht auf der Tagesordnung stehen oder für den Zweck der Sitzung irrelevant sind.

This matter is not on today´s agenda.

We are not following the adopted agenda.

This discussion does not pertain to the business at hand.(… keinen Bezug zur Tagesordnung)

It is irrelevant to the subject under discussion.

I am afraid this isn´t really relevant to our discussion.

I don't think that that's really a question that is relevant.

In my opinion, we have been focusing too much on items which are not of relevance to our meeting.

It would go beyond the scope of our meeting.

I´m afraid that´s outside the scope of this meeting.

The meeting appears to be "going round in circles".

Mr Chair / Madam Chair(man), I call for the order(s) of the day.