Parlianet in the News

From paper to Parlianet – citizens of Birmingham put their fingers on the political pulse

6 August 2002

Pressure is increasing on public libraries to provide access to current parliamentary information but libraries are finding it difficult to keep up with demand. Stephen Wood, Head of Service: Social Sciences at Birmingham Central Library, explains how one of the largest public reference libraries in the UK is using the Internet to address the challenge.

As one of the largest public reference libraries in the country, Birmingham Central Library has a huge range and depth of information resources both current and historical. Our clients are primarily the citizens of Birmingham, but we receive and answer thousands of enquiries on all kinds of topics from all over the UK. As part of our service, Birmingham Central Library has a responsibility to provide access to parliamentary information for our users who include businesses, students, independent learners and members of the general public – in fact anyone who needs to find out information about parliamentary activity, government legislation, policies, programmes and initiatives.

The Library has a wide range of parliamentary information in print form including a partial set of parliamentary papers from 1800 to 1917, a complete set from 1917 to date, plus sets of Acts of Parliament, Statutory Instruments, Hansard and Halsbury’s. We also have papers available on microfiche and access to CD-ROM services, all of which we have used for many years. Unfortunately, because the information is in different formats, response rates to enquiries varied enormously, as staff have to use different indexes and files to find the relevant information. Once found, this information is not always the most up-to-date, as the political arena is constantly changing.

An increase in public demand, combined with advances in technology over the past few years, has seen public libraries introducing a range of electronic resources to supplement traditional print collections.

Here at Birmingham Central Library we wanted to be able to provide a service that would deliver comprehensive parliamentary information and, because of the dynamic and fast moving pace of today’s political world, we also wanted a service that was frequently updated so that the most current information was available. On top of these demands, we were also looking for a service that had a search tool that was easy to use and, importantly for a public service on a limited budget, one that offered value for money.

After considering a range of electronic services from different companies we were convinced that Parlianet met all our stringent requirements for an electronic parliamentary information service. Parlianet (www.parlianet.com), which has been developed by electronic publishers Justis Publishing Limited, enables users to access information on events in Westminster quickly and effectively. The service also provides an index to the proceedings and publications of both Houses of Parliament, including Hansard, with extensive links to full text documents, and it is regularly updated to reflect the latest political developments.

Since devolution, some of the enquiries we receive have been for information on political developments in the Welsh and Northern Ireland Assemblies. Before Parlianet, which provides access to information on debates, statements and written answers in these assemblies, such questions would take us a considerable amount of time to research since even Parliament’s own Web site does not cover this information.

Justis Publishing trained our staff so that they were fully familiar with the site, its contents and the advanced search engine. Currently 6 staff use the service regularly to respond to user enquiries, and we plan to extend that number to 16 people over the next few months. All staff have found Parlianet user friendly and the format guides us easily through the vast amount of available information. Using the search engine, we can find relevant information on generic subjects or specific issues raised in Parliament since 1979.

Overall, the main benefit of using Parlianet is that it has allowed us to answer enquiries on all aspects of parliamentary information more quickly. The staff here and our readers have a greater understanding of the information coming out of Westminster and feel more confident of their political knowledge.

To find out more about Parlianet, visit www.parlianet.com. To arrange a free trial, please contact our Sales Department on +44 (0)20 7284 8080 or email parlianet@justis.com.