What does "backbench" mean?

A bench at the back of a room or seating area.

Backbench

adj, noun

adj, noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Noun

1
A bench at the back of a room or seating area.
"But no one was waiting at the backbench and the older fellow looked as if he had dug in to stay."
2
any of the seats occupied by backbenchers in the House of Commons wordnet
3
A bench at the back of a room or seating area.; In a house of legislature following the model of the Westminster system (such as the UK House of Commons), any bench behind either of the front benches and occupied by members of each party group who are not party leaders, cabinet ministers, holders of offices such as the whips, etc. New-Zealand, UK, attributive, often
"His spacious quarters indicate his transition from backbench upstart to established member of the governing team."
4
A bench at the back of a room or seating area.; The back row of a classroom.
"The petitioner who was a student of Class X was in the backbench when a lady teacher was teaching there."
5
A bench at the back of a room or seating area.; The back pew of a church.
"Through this two-year, transcontinental colloquy, through this vast outpouring of personal sentiments and reactions from poor homes and rich, from backwoods cabins and metropolitan penthouses, from the young and old, from dubious backbench sitters and busy pillars of the congregations, from the bitter and the satisfied, each person telling it as he or she saw it."

Show 4 more definitions

6
A bench at the back of a room or seating area.; A back bench in a courtroom.
"Seated on the backbench of the courtroom, Emerald had mixed feelings."
7
A bench at the back of a room or seating area.; The back seat of an automobile, van, or bus.
"They scooted into a double seat near the rear and noticed that even with four people squeezed into the backbench, they had been lucky to find the last empty places."
8
A position of secondary importance.
"Niger, as a country belongs to the backbench of African soccer."
9
A group of top-level journalists who jointly review submissions and decide on the layout and emphasis of the newspaper.
"A good spread could be allotted on a news page if the dead person was deemed worthy by the powerful and sceptical members of the “backbench” of the senior sub-editors."

Adjective

1
relating to the back benches in parliament not-comparable
"He prefers to be a backbench MP."
2
Pertaining to the preparation of a donor organ prior to transplantation. not-comparable
"Cold preservation is a component of the donor organ resection procedure, not the backbench preparation."
3
Secondary or inactive. not-comparable
"In contrast, the less able, the backbench players, tend to stick around, and if they're in a position of power, they are also inclined to hire and promote other also-rans or, worse, people incapable of even finishing the race."

"He prefers to be a backbench MP."

From back + bench.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.