This may be a strange question but I visited the House of Commons the other day (as you do...no, I was just there as a interested tourist ;-)) and was listening to one of their sittings. There was a woman in the Speaker's chair (can't really describe her, but she had white hair and may have been in her 50s/60s). Now, I don't know that much about UK politics/the parliament but I thought I read somewhere that the Speaker was Michael Martin. Can someone tell me who that woman might have been? Was she maybe one of Mr Martin's deputies (I didn't find her in the list of MPs on the Commons homepage)?

Thanks for yr answers
Cheers, IEB