Siegfried Kampl

Siegfried Kampl (born 13 August 1936) is an Austrian politician. Kampl has been mayor of the town of Gurk since 1991, and was a member of the Federal Council of Austria (the Bundesrat) from 2004 to 2009.

Biography and political career

Kampl was born in Steuerberg, in the Austrian state of Carinthia. He completed the agricultural vocational school and an agricultural technical school.

Kampl's backtracking on resignation caused an even bigger controversy because, coincidentally, he was scheduled to take over the six-month rotating presidency of the Federal Council on 1 July. Left-leaning lawmakers demanded that Chancellor Wolfgang Schüssel intervene to prevent Kampl from assuming the presidency of the upper house, and threatened a walkout if he was allowed to do so. In the end, the Federal Council resolved matters itself by passing a constitutional amendment, informally labelled Lex Kampl (Latin for "Kampl's law"), allowing the Council to, by a two-thirds vote, replace anyone scheduled to take over the rotating presidency with a different member of the same party. The amendment was agreed upon by all four main parties (including the FPÖ and BZÖ) and passed unanimously, although BZÖ member Roland Zellot left the chamber before the vote. The amendment entered into force on 25 June, just in time to prevent Kampl from becoming president of the Council.