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Parliamentary Library
Contact
Phone (02) 9230 2383
Fax (02) 9231 1932
libreq@parliament.nsw.gov.au
Opening Hours
The Library hours of opening are:
- Sitting Days: 8.30am until 7pm on Tuesday and Wednesday ; 6pm on Thursday
- Non-sitting Days: 9.00am to 5.00pm
Management
- Manager, Reference and Information Services
Ms Deborah Brown
Phone: (02) 9230 2382
Deborah.Brown@parliament.nsw.gov.au
- Reference and Information services
- Electronic information services
- Interlibrary loans
- On-line searches, including Census Data
- Newspaper clippings service; and Media monitoring service
- Training in use of library services
- Manager, Research Service
Dr David Clune
Phone: (02) 9230 2484
David.Clune@parliament.nsw.gov.au
- Research service
- Parliamentary Library publications
- Current awareness and journal indexing services
Reference and Information Services
Reference and Information Services provides a wide range of services directly to clients through its reference and information services, collections and databases, and supports the research and policy analysis role of the Parliamentary Research Services. The program is committed to ensuring that Members have prompt access to the information and documentation they require to carry out their parliamentary duties. This is achieved through a combination of the following:
- continual refinement of understanding of client needs;
- staff members committed to the maintenance of their professional skills;
- the building of databases or specialised information resources accessible to Members and staff;
- cooperation with other libraries, information networks and organisations throughout the world which can provide information resources when required;
- extensive use of advanced information technology.
- training in use of library services
Reference and Information Services staff:
Research Service
The Research Service provides in depth analysis and advice on legislation before the NSW Parliament and State issues and policies as required by Members of the NSW Parliament. The Research Officers between them have subject expertise in Law, Politics and Government, Environment, Economics and Social Issues. The Research Service mainly carries out its work in response to legislation proposed or actual and issues contained in legislation before Parliament. It also strives to anticipate Members' needs and welcomes requests from individual Members. It is responsible for publishing Research Papers for general distribution to Members.
The Research Service is also responsible for the Current Accessions List and SDI (Selective Dissemination of Information) Service, which strives to keep clients up to date in areas of special interest to them. To this end it monitors current journal literature, indexes relevant articles, and maintains a serials indexing database on APLIS.
Research Service staff:
Technical Services
Technical services is responsible for the selection, acquisition, cataloguing, classification, processing and binding and continued maintenance of an extensive collection of information resources, including Government Publications, printed material, microfiche, CD-ROMs, audio and videotapes, and so on. Its main task is the organisation and maintenance of specialised and relevant collections. Government Publications are of special importance and a separate section has been established to select, acquire, catalogue, classify, process and bind them. Resources are acquired by way of purchase, gift and legal deposit in accordance with Collection Development Policies reflecting the constitutional responsibilities and needs of Members of Parliament.
Technical Services staff:
Library Administration and Personnel
This Program creates the operational environment that supports the performance of the Library's other programs. It encompasses the overall co-ordination of the Library's policies and the assigning of priorities relevant to the Library's mission. An important part of this role is the allocation of the resources available to allow the Library to meet its objectives effectively and efficiently.
Library Administration and Personnel staff:
Mission, Aims and Objectives
Mission: To identify and fulfil the information needs of Members of Parliament and the Parliamentary Institution.
Aim: To be the centre of excellence for the provision of information, documentation and research services for Members of the NSW Parliament.
Objectives: The objectives of the Parliamentary Library relate to the Parliament House Corporate Goals, primarily focusing on maintaining a service which provides services which support Members in their electoral and constituency duties.
History of the NSW Parliamentary Library
The NSW Parliamentary Library was established by the administrative action of the Legislative Council in 1840. With the introduction of responsible government in 1856 the Library became a Joint Parliamentary Library, whose functions were further specified by resolutions of the two Houses in 1862 and 1968. From session to session the Parliamentary Library operates under the general oversight of the Joint Library Committee.
The NSW Parliamentary Library is the oldest of the several parliamentary libraries in Australia, and is also one of the oldest official libraries in the country having a continuous administrative history. During the first one hundred or so years of its operation, in common with its contemporary counterparts, the Library might be described as a gentlemen's library with quite generously endowed collections managed along conventional lines by a relatively small staff. The style of its operation was generally responsive, rather than pro-active, reflecting the requirements of the era. 1906 saw the completion of the first ever purpose-built accommodation for the Library (now the Jubilee Room), before which the Library had functioned, as it continued to function, in a variety of converted physical surroundings, (which could generally be described as inadequate and overcrowded), both within and beyond Parliament House.
By the 1950s the desires both of the Library's management, as well as of its clientele, were changing, and a number of significant developments began to occur which gradually transformed the Library and its operations into what it is today. The post war years saw the recognition of the need for professional qualifications for librarians, and by the early 1950s staff were beginning to obtain formal library qualifications, as well as taking an active role in developing the library profession. The Library obtained legal deposit status for conventional material published in NSW in 1952. The earlier fixed location arrangement of books was replaced by the Dewey Decimal Classification in the late 1950s; the nucleus of a modern specialist Reference and Information Service was established in the early 1960s, and the Library began to market its services to Members and systematically to anticipate demands which might be made on it, rather than waiting for them to occur. By 1975 the advances in photocopying technology meant that the newspaper index (dating from 1910) was replaced by a more flexible newspaper clippings service. Improvements in photocopying provide one instance of the radical ways in which libraries of all kinds have been able to extend services to clients in recent decades as a result of technological change.
Pressure on accommodation forced the Library to review its acquisition and retention policies, and long runs of no-longer essential serials and other items were progressively donated to various university libraries throughout NSW. The expansion of library services, coupled with the growth in demand, led to successive increases in staff; in 1955 the staff numbered 10, by 1965 this had grown to 12, rising to 19 in 1975, 30 in 1985 and 37 in 1995. Electronic media monitoring began in the late 1970s. 1980 saw the re-location of the entire Library operations to our current accommodation, with access to on-line data bases being offered progressively from the early 1980s and the introduction of the first fax machine in the Parliament (with the assistance of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Library) in 1984. The Library was heavily involved in the introduction of word processing throughout the Parliament during the 1980s. 1986 saw the purchase of the Library's first PC, to allow automation of our in-house Hansard index, and overall automation of Library operations culminated in the launching of our Automated Parliamentary Library Information System (APLIS) during the Library's sesquicentennial year in 1990. APLIS was the first successful large scale automated system in the Parliament. During the 1980s the Library further refined its collection development policies in line with both budgetary and space constraints, and currently our acquisitions are increasingly in microforms or in various electronic forms. The Library access a number of online services and holds some titles on CD-Rom.
The most significant recent development is the creation in 1993 of the Library's Research Service, which now has a staff of eight and publishes an extensive range of bills digests, briefing notes, background papers and electorate profiles.
In late 1996, after an exhaustive tendering process, the Library signed a contract with the Australian office of Sirsi Corporation to replace our existing APLIS system with an Integrated Library Management System (ILMS) known as Unicorn. This ILMS project will include the introduction of imaging technology for newspaper clippings, press releases and other important library and parliamentary information.
In summary current services include reference and information services, circulation, newspaper clippings and electronic media monitoring, management of a collection which has a strong emphasis on official publications, and which combines historical depths and riches with effective up to date information resources. The Parliamentary Library holds extensive legal resources. Our automation enables the provision of personalised SDI (Selective Dissemination of Information) services to our clients. As mentioned above the Library's research service responds to Members' legislative and other needs through its range of publications, and individual briefings.
The Library's primary clientele are Members of Parliament, their staff, and the staff of the Parliament. Other, secondary, clients include former Members, Members of other parliaments, the press gallery, and, to a limited extent, members of the public. The Library's services are characterised as being timely, personalised to meet Members' individual needs, objective, and politically neutral.
Last modified 12/03/2009 16:49:56 : Update this page