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Women parliamentarians could be rendered "invisible" if the next Commons Speaker is a man, one of the leading candidates to replace John Bercow in the chair has claimed.

Labour's former deputy leader Harriet Harman said having a female Speaker would show the country that Parliament has modernised and that men and women are on an equal footing.

The Mother of the House - a title bestowed on the longest continually-serving female MP - said in an interview on Sky's Sophy Ridge on Sunday: "We've had 157 Speakers so far in our Parliament's history - only one woman ever.

"Now that's partly because Parliament used to be a parliament of men. Politics was what men did, women abided by the decisions and men made them, but things have changed and in fact Parliament has changed.

"We've now got more than 200 women members of the House of Commons and I think it would show that Parliament has changed to have a woman in the chair."

She continued: "We've got a man as Prime Minister, a man as leader of the opposition, a man as leader of the SNP - the third largest party.

"If we put a man in the chair it will render all those women invisible and I think we do need to show women and men in the country that Parliament has changed, it has modernised, and one of those big changes is that women and men are on an equal footing.

"Putting a woman in the chair will show that, and anyway after 600 years, having only managed one woman, I think it is time for the next."

The election of the next Commons Speaker will take place on November 4, after Mr Bercow - who has held the office since 2009 - takes the chair for the final time on October 31.

Reporting by PA.