The Parliamentary Library of New Zealand

Brief History of the Library

The General Assembly of New Zealand first met in Auckland in 1854. The first money to buy books to establish a library was voted in 1856. In 1858 the Clerk of the House of Representatives was also named the first librarian. When Parliament moved from Auckland to Wellington after the session of 1864 the library moved also and was installed in its own adapted building. The stock was somewhat reduced by the loss in an earlier transfer of a case of books in a shipwreck, along with many Parliamentary papers and records.

Despite the loss the library soon outgrew its accommodation, but it was not until 1897 that plans for a new library building were approved. The General Assembly Library building was finally occupied in 1901. It was built in a distinctive neo-gothic style with some grand public rooms. In 1907 fire destroyed the rest of the wooden Parliament Buildings, but the library was saved by its brick construction and a fire door.

In its early years the library's main functions were to collect books and periodicals relevant to MPs' needs and to make them available for use and borrowing. In his summary of the first hundred years of the library in 1958, the then Chief Librarian, J.O. Wilson, refers to the growth in requests for information and the attempts being made to meet the changing demand. Collecting New Zealand publications was boosted by the passage in 1903 of the General Assembly Library Act which required publishers to deposit two copies of their publications with the Library. Exchange agreements with other Commonwealth countries and the United States were instituted. In the absence of a National Library the Library's collections had some of the character of a national collection.

When the creation of a National Library was being discussed this made the General Assembly Library seem an important potential component. In 1965 the National Library Act established the National Library of New Zealand, made up of the National Library Service , the Alexander Turnbull Library and the General Assembly Library. The union lasted until 1985 when the former Legislative Department which had served Parliament was replaced by the Parliamentary Service and the now renamed Parliamentary Library became a part of this. In 1987, as a consequence, the Library's legal deposit function was passed to the National Library as it was felt to be a national function. The Library, however, still receives one of the three legal deposit copies now required.

During the later 20th century concern had grown over the safety of the Parliament Buildings built after the 1907 fire and the General Assembly Library building in the event of a serious earthquake. At the end of 1990 the Library moved, with much of the rest of Parliament, into temporary accommodation in a nearby office block. The two buildings were strengthened to be 'earthquake proof' and extended with much rebuilding to accommodate an enlarged Parliament. Five years and two more fires later the elaborately refurbished buildings were reoccupied early in 1996.

Setting of the Library

Since 1951, when the Legislative Council was abolished, the New Zealand Parliament has consisted of a single House of Representatives. MPs have been elected from geographical electorates, the number of which has grown with the population to a current figure of 99. The Parliamentary term is three years; elections can be called before the end of a term, but in practice rarely are. The government has been formed from the party with a majority of seats, with the Prime Minister the leader of that party in Parliament. Coalition and minority governments have been rare and often only the two major parties of the day have had MPs in Parliament. Four seats have been reserved for Maori MPs elected by voters on the Maori electoral roll. Elections have been conducted according to 'first past the post' rules.

Many years of growing dissatisfaction with aspects of this system expressed itself in referenda held in 1992 and 1993. Voters opted for the introduction of a form of mixed member proportional representation, commonly referred to as MMP. The first election to be conduced under the new system will be held on October 12 this year. The number of MPs will increase to at least 120: 60 elected from electorates from the general roll, 5 from the Maori roll and the remainder selected from party lists according to the percentages of the party vote.

The Parliamentary Service is administered by the Parliamentary Service Commission, comprising seven MPs, and chaired by the Speaker. The Parliamentary Librarian reports to the General Manager, who is the chief executive of the Parliamentary Service. There is a Library Committee of five MPs, also chaired by the Speaker, which advises the Parliamentary Service Commission. While the Parliamentary Library is no longer part of the National Library, it maintains good working relations with it and takes advantage of its close physical proximity for interloan borrowing. The day to day working of the legal deposit arrangement also necessitates close co-operation.

Organisation and Staffing

The Parliamentary Library is divided into four sections: Reference, Database, Serials/Acquisitions and International Documents which together cover the major part of its work. The heads of these sections, together with the Development Manager, Legislative Analyst and PA/Office Manager report to the Parliamentary Librarian. The Development Manager is responsible for special projects, especially research on strategic issues and the development of new systems, and the Legislative Analyst for producing the Bills Digest.

The Reference Section provides all the Library's reference and research services to Parliament. All requests for information are directed to it. The Section has eleven librarians, with extra help when the House is sitting, a statistician, an economist, one library assistant and the circulation assistant. The increasing workload and a recent increase in the number of librarians to meet it have caused the organisation of the Section to be looked at. A possible reorganisation is currently being worked out.

The Database Section produces the Library's newspaper index and catalogue. It also runs the Profile service, a current information service for MPs. The Section has five and a half librarians and six and a half library assistants. Each service has a senior librarian in charge. The assistants work across all three services equally. The grouping of these three services together takes advantage of the similar approach required by them and the use of a single thesaurus and unified authority control. Also attached to the Section is the Library's bindery, with two binders and an assistant.

The Serials /Acquisitions Section is responsible for most of the Library's acquisitions, including those items received via legal deposit. It also acquires the library's serials, and is responsible for controlling the loose copies before binding. It controls and catalogues those serials which are held for a limited period only. The Section has two librarians and five library assistants.

The International Documents Section, unlike the other three sections, has a dual focus. Its resources of knowledge and stock support the Reference Section in its service to Parliament. At the same time the International Documents Collection is available to everyone in the country and use is encouraged. The Collection is a depository collection for many international agencies and receives parliamentary material on exchange. The greater part of the collection is uncatalogued and controlled by the Section. The Section has two librarians and two library assistants.

All librarians in the Library have library qualifications, and all but one or two are graduates. Librarians are recruited with varying amounts of experience. Retention varies from a year to decades, with many staying about two to five years. There is scope for promotion within the Library but it is Parliamentary Service policy that all positions be publicly advertised and appointment is competitive. Librarians are encouraged to keep up to date with brief courses, but study leave is not usually granted.

Library assistants are also all graduates, frequently, but not always, recruited straight from university. Applicants for the Master of Library and Information Studies course are expected to have already worked in a library and it is from the pool of prospective applicants that the Library commonly hires. It is expected that library assistants will stay for a year or two before moving on. The high turnover is compensated for by a continuing stream of new keen quick learners.

Library Collections and Other Resources

The Library's two recent moves have been used as opportunities to weed the book and serial stock substantially. As a result of this and the increased storage space available in the refurbished library building, the Library now has all its stock housed on the premises for the first time in decades. As at June 1995 the Library held 315,976 monograph volumes and 190,485 bound volumes of serials. The uncatalogued International Documents Collection, which is measured rather than counted, filled 1,846 metres of shelving. The Library held almost 14,000 microfilms, mostly newspapers, and over 300,000 microfiche, mostly part of the International Documents Collection. Small numbers of video and audio cassettes are held, and several hundred CD-ROMS and diskettes.

At the same date the Library receives 244 newspaper titles and 7,565 serials titles. The majority of these titles are received under the legal deposit provision, with subscriptions only for overseas titles and extra copies of New Zealand titles. The Library is constantly reviewing the balance between its print collections and access to on-line services.

The Library has two small specialist collections which are important resources for the Reference service. The Library holds copies of press statements issued by ministers and MPs. Deposit is voluntary, but the Library actively encourages it. The statements are very heavily used. At present they are held in hard copy and bound annually, but it is hoped to convert them to an automated database.

The second collection is the submissions to select committees. Public submissions are invited for almost all bills when they are being considered by select committees; similarly for some petitions and occasional inquiries. Once the committee has reported to the House, one set of submissions must be deposited in the Library, which makes them available to anyone who wishes to see them.

In its refurbished building the Library's reading room for MPs and Parliamentary staff is a re-creation of the old Parliamentary lobby, destroyed in the 1907 fire. It has displays of newspapers and periodicals and is adjacent to the Reference Section. The original main reading room now houses the International Documents Section. It incorporates space for users of that collection and has external as well as internal access. The Library maintains a room supplied with library materials close to the chamber.

The Library is, in fact, only a couple of minutes walk from the Chamber but its location at one end of the spread of Parliamentary buildings means it does not lie on anyone's direct route. This situation is not altered by the fact that the Library shares its building with the Press Gallery. In the past when Parliament was more compact, and the Library shared its building with MPs and staff, they were frequent visitors. Now visits have largely been replaced by communication via telephone, fax and e-mail.

Services and Products

The Library's main service is that offered by the Reference Section. In the year to June 1995 the Section answered 14,717 reference questions. Over half of these were quick queries which could be answered in fewer than fifteen minutes. 12% of queries required more than an hour's work to fulfil. Each librarian has areas of specialisation, but is expected to be able to deal with whatever comes in as required.

There are two non-librarian specialists in the Section, the statistician and the economist. Both answer the more complex queries in their fields, but also offer extra services. The statistician will offer advice on the validity and use of statistics. The economist provides advice on economics, trade and industry and produces occasional background papers.

The Reference Section is also responsible for taping selected current affairs and news programmes from radio and television. These can be viewed on request in the Library, or replayed in MPs' offices through Parliament's sound and vision system. Approximately fifty programmes per week are taped, and the tapes are held for one month before being recycled. A weekly list of programmes recorded, called Replay, is circulated to MPs.

In 1993 the Library introduced a Bills Digest service. The digests are compiled by the Legislative Analyst, a lawyer, and put out shortly after the bill's introduction in the House. Each Digest contains the purpose of the bill, background information and comments on the main provisions. It may also include notes on issues and implications and views of interested parties. The intention of the Digest is to help MPs inform themselves as the bill goes before a select committee and is debated in the House. In 1995 the Legislative Analyst produced 71 digests.

Almost all MPs are members of the Profile Service, the current information service run by the Database Section. Approximately 1400 serials titles, together with the library's monograph and International Documents Collection intake, are scanned for items likely to be of interest to MPs. A brief descriptive abstract is written for selected items and subject headings assigned from a list of 100 terms, grouped under thirteen broad subject areas. MPs choose their areas of interest from the same list, selecting any mixture of individual terms or the broad subject areas. Once a week an automatic match is run between MPs' profiles and the terms on that week's abstracts. Each MP receives a personal bulletin of abstracts matched with the individual terms in their profile and also any broad subject bulletins they have requested. Once a month the Service produces a general bulletin, containing a selection of the month's abstracts, which is circulated to all MPs and Parliamentary staff. All recipients of bulletins may request the hard copy of any item abstracted. Photocopies of articles are despatched within 24 hours and books lent. In the year to June 1995 the Profile Service wrote 1,557 abstracts and responded to 7,816 requests.

The Profile Service abstracts are maintained in a database which serves as a useful resource for Reference staff. The Library's other two major in-house databases are the catalogue and the newspaper index. The Library has maintained a newspaper index since 1949; originally on cards and since late 1989 automated. Database Section staff index five major daily papers and one Sunday paper. Items are selected for their relevance to MPs and indexed with the same focus. Index entries for most papers are available on-line the day after publication. In the year to June 1995 the Section indexed a total of 43,999 articles from 1,552 newspapers.

The Library seeks actively to promote its services. New MPs are introduced to the Library and its services as part of their orientation. This is followed with individual contact by the Parliamentary Librarian, the Profile service Librarian and others as opportunity provides. New parliamentary staff receive individual or group orientation from Reference staff. Social occasions such as morning teas hosted by Reference are used to promote services and contacts. To mark the move back to its refurbished building the Library organised a series of evenings both for MPs and for other librarians.

As well as the background papers, digests and bulletins produced as part of its services the Library produces a number of guides which it updates periodically. The Guide to Services is a general overview of what the Library can offer MPs and staff and how they can get access to it. There is a similar brief guide to the International Documents Collection. Newspapers Currently Received lists all the newspapers currently received by the Library.

The Library serves all 99 MPs and parliamentary staff, currently numbering around 600. Parliamentary staff include the staff in ministers' offices, which are situated at Parliament, and electorate secretaries. Accredited members of the Press Gallery have limited borrowing rights as do former MPs and the children and partners of sitting MPs. Special permission may be given for researchers to use the Library. The Governor -General and officers of Parliament, e.g. the ombudsmen, are also served.

Developments in Automation

In 1995 the Library's minicomputer was upgraded to a PC LAN running Novell network operating software and linked via a fibre optic backbone. The network currently has about forty PCs attached to it, but the number is expanding. Similar LANs exist in all the other parts of Parliament. A single core backbone links all the LANs and supports all shared applications.

Since 1989 Parliament has had an arrangement with GP Print, the privatised former Government Printing Office, to have databases derived from the printing of Hansard, bills, and so on. These databases are hosted on VAX computers at GP Print, along with three of the Library's databases: the newspaper index, catalogue and current information service. The data for the Library's three databases is created on the Library PCs and transported via a fibre optic gateway to GP Print for overnight updating. Access to the databases is via the same gateway. The software presently used for the Library databases is BASIS K. This is now unsupported and hence at the end of its useful life.

Library staff use a wide range of external databases in their work. Access to most external databases is by dial-up modems. Selected users have LAN gateways to the Internet. The Library has a telnet connection to the National Library's New Zealand Bibliographic Network (NZBN) and Kiwinet, a suite of New Zealand databases which it hosts. Kiwinet includes the Parliamentary Library's own newspaper index and Bills Digest, which are made publicly available in this way.

The urgent need to replace the BASIS K software has prompted the Library to embark on a major automation project. It is planned to purchase an integrated library system which will retain the benefits of current database creation, management and searching strengths, while allowing the automation of other library functions. At present circulation and serials control are still done manually. An acquisitions system has been set up, but as a stand alone system.

The new system will also enable the Library to make its databases available on PCs throughout Parliament for the first time. For a variety of reasons this has not been feasible previously but the demand has been voiced and the Library sees it as an important aspect of maintaining service and a visible presence across the whole of Parliament.

Important Developments in the Library

The election of a new government in 1984 has become a reference point in New Zealand for dating the beginning of changes across the economic, social and political spectrum. The environment in which the Library works has naturally been affected by these and the Library, and Parliament, are continuing to adjust along with everyone else.

An important feature of the last ten years has been the growth of awareness of New Zealand's multicultural makeup. While Pacific Islanders have been making an increasing impact on New Zealand society, it is the return to prominence of Maori concerns which has dominated this awareness. Treaty of Waitangi issues are central to many areas of public interest, and the Maori language is now one of New Zealand's two official languages. Fluent Maori speakers are relatively scarce and in demand. In recent years the Library has often had at least one or two staff of Maori descent, but not fluent Maori speakers. In 1996 for the first time the Library offered a Maori scholarship to a Maori graduate of Maori descent, able to speak Maori. The intention is that they spend one year in the Library as an assistant, gaining the necessary experience to apply for the Master of Library and Information Studies. The Library will assist with their fees for the course and in return they will be bonded to work for another year in the Library after qualifying. The scholarship enables the Library to strengthen its Maori resources while also encouraging Maori into librarianship.

In the very near future the Library faces a challenge quite as big as any other it has faced: the election of a Parliament under MMP rules. The Library has no greater insight than anyone else about what the effects of this will be, so is in part trying to plan for the unknown. But one immediate effect has been the proliferation of political parties both within and without Parliament. Each new Parliamentary party setting itself up demands its party's share of Parliamentary Service resources and services and frequently makes a greater call on the Library's resources than the previous sum of its individual MPs' requests.

The second obvious effect that will be felt in October is the 20% increase in the number of MPs. The MPs themselves, with their secretaries and research staff, can be expected to have a proportionate effect on demand for orientation and ongoing training, and for the full range of Library services. For the first time, also, half of the MPs will be party list MPs, without the local responsibilities of the traditional electorate MPs. Whether or not this will have an effect on the type and amount of demand is still a matter for conjecture.

The Library finds itself, at the end of the 20th century, building on the strengths of its past and adapting as effectively as it can to changes both in the Parliament it exists to serve and in the world of information which it brings to the MPs. In an increasingly competitive environment it must promote its services with as much impact as it can achieve. Promotion must be supported by continuing high quality and innovative service to an increasing number of clients across an expanding Parliamentary complex, and potentially to the MPs' local bases as well. Continuing developments in automation are seen as integral to achieving these aims. The Library is fortunate that it is in a position where it can anticipate that it will be able to meet the demands placed upon it and contribute to the changing environment of Parliament.

References

Report of the Chief Librarian, General Assembly Library for the year ended 31 March 1958 (special centennial issue). (Appendix to the Journals H.32).

Report of the Parliamentary Service Commission and statement of accounts for the year ended 30 June 1995. (Appendix to the Journals A.2).

Matheson D. Ian. Unpublished draft of paper on the Parliamentary Library.

MacEachern, Ruth. Library automation feasibility study : a report prepared for the Parliamentary Librarian. June 1996.