If you have a look at the swiss parliament (national council) seat plan, you can only find 6 seats for the Federal Councilors. But they are 7 as we know. Where does the 7th Federal Councilor sit?

Maybe the 7th is the assigned president (Speaker) @ no.1

president of the parliament (national council) is an elected member of parliament. Separation of executive and legislative powers is also very important.

Most of the time, during legislative processes you actually only got one (or maybe more) federal councilor present who is responsible for the concerned issue and joins the discussion - but has no power as he belongs to the executive.

Officially, they are all assemdled in parliament only for representative reasons.
Thats the case if a new councilor is sworn in or every four years, when they have all to be confirmed by the parliament after the main national elections. Maybe the seventh member takes a scrutineers place, as they count out votes in a separate room.
So its for practical reasons and not a legislative requirement.

Thanks for posting this!
Who sits next to #3?

http://joe.aranya.ch/main/switzerland/4government.htm

Here you go

does not provide the answer to my question.
The Federal assembly = National Council + Council of States

Doesn't answer my question either!

It is perfectly simple. Number 7 sits opposite to the colleagues. I fail to see the problem

sorry, but there is NOT just ONE parliamentary president but TWO, one for the Senate (Ständerat) and one for the House of Representatives (Nationalrat)

If a member of either house gets elected into the Federal Council, he/she automatically leaves the legislative

'
Howcome Staenderats have Seats?

okay guys,

parliament = legislative = Ständerat/Senate and Nationalrat/House of Reps)
government = executive = Ministers/Federal Councilors/Bundesrat

to answer OP's question: There's no need for ALL Federal Councilors to have fixed, PERMANENT seats in the parliament, as they are hardly present and have NO power in this chamber. They just join debates for consultations/ceremonies BUT logically cant vote.

heres a picture of the governements room, where they actually MUST have their individual seats (plus extra seats for secretaries and chancellor=chief of staff)




check out also the Senate/Ständerat

http://www.parlament.ch/e/organe-mit...s/default.aspx

you got also "only" 6 seats for Federal Councilors, which is perfectly logical, as during debates, at least one of them joins also the process in the other chamber, the Natinalrat/House of Represantavives. (and vice versa)
Thats maybe the best answer to OP's question.

The jokes about that are as old as Methusalem, and go by the thousands

But of course "Stände" is a very old word for Cantons

In the provided link, it's stated that: "Each year the members of parliament choose one of the 7 ministers as the president of the Federal Assembly for a government period of one year"
If this is true, then the only time when all the federal assembly is congregated, the President seat (number 1) is taken by the president of confederation and the 6 remaining have a seat. The president of the national council as member of parliament has his/her own seat in the assembly. Seems to solve the problem as per Powerlifter's statement there are very rare occasions where the 7 are required to be simultaneously present. So this only works if President Confederation = PResident of federal assembly = National Council + Council of states.
The only thing worrying me is that mixes the executive and legislative powers.

What does that mean? Where? Which number?

Do you mean the pull out a folding chair?