The Combination of Legislation and Information:
Current Status of the Library and Information Service, Legislative Yuan, Taipei, Taiwan, R.O.C.

Brief History of the Library & Information Service (LIS)

The Foundation of LIS

In accordance with the official functions of the Legislative Yuan, the Department of the Compilation of the Legislative Yuan was founded in the Ning Jing period during the 1930's. In order to simplify the organizational structure of the Legislative Yuan the staff of the Department of the Compilation was reduced and special working groups were formed after the government of the Republic of China moved to Taiwan in 1949. The Library & Information Service, namely, the LIS, is the said institute.

The mission of the Library & Information Service (LIS), as stipulated in Article 4 of the Executive Regulations of the Secretariat, the Legislative Yuan, 1953, is to acquire and manage legal and legislative documents, with the objectives of providing the necessary resources for the legislature through analysis, research, and reference services, in support of the legislators' representative and legislative functions.

In the past decade, the LIS had been re-organized into four functional units, that is, the Library, the Law Information Centre, the Computer Centre and the Newspaper Clipping Center to support the research and law-making functions of legislators, and provide current information to conform to the modern trends of our society.

In addition to strengthening the functions of the Library, the objectives of the LIS include developing LEGISIS (the LEGISlative Information System) and the network system in the Legislative Yuan, as well as improving the quality of information retrieved to achieve high efficiency.

As society moves ahead, the transmission of information has become much more diversified. Starting in 1983, the LIS began offering information services ranging from printed matter to electronic media in various forms. The LEGISIS, which was developed by the LIS step by step, contains eight sub-systems, including the Legislative Electronic Bulletin Board System, the Legislators' Interpellation Information System, the Chinese Code Information System, the Chinese Code Amendment Information System, the Legislative Literature Information System, the Legislative News Information System, the Legislative Record Information System and the Legislative Yuan Library OPAC (On-line Public Access catalogue) System.

In the use of the LEGISIS network, the LIS completed the network construction in the First and Second Buildings of legislators' offices and the Legislative Yuan through the dial-up method of connection to the host computer in March 1993. At the same time, LEGISIS became on-line and in service

Looking back over the past ten years, the beginning of the computerisation project was in a "zero budget and zero staff" situation. From planning, through designing to implementation, we have reached a point where the system is totally open for our users to use it freely, and our service is integrated. For a Chinese information application system, it sets a successful example which is highly visible.

Strategies for Development

In the year 1981, the legislators expressed their strong desire for a computer-based legislative information service. By 1984, LIS had formulated a concrete plan that was approved by former President Ni for the development of a computerised information service.

In the meanwhile, a Committee on Computerised Information Management was organized. Former Director of LIS, Karl Min Ku, was the executive secretary of the Committee. Foreign computer information experts were invited to be the Committee's advisors. A domestic ad hoc working group for "the Development of Information and Research Services" was also set up in September 1985, and has been sponsored partially since then by the Asia Foundation. The present writer was appointed as the leader of this development project.

The LIS has completed its primary goal with collaborations and efforts three years later. Dr. Sheldon R. Severinghaus in 1988 pointed out in his article, 'Legislative Reform in Taiwan', "that the Legislative Yuan, through remarkable development of its library and information service, is now revolutionising its legislative processes in the Republic of China".

A cautious planning process had been accepted for setting up this nationwide accessible information system, as follows:

1. Confirmation of Information Requests - The staff of LIS communicated with potential users within the Legislative Yuan, including legislators, their aids and the staff of Legislative Yuan in order to understand their information needs.
   

2. Definition of the Project Scope - A "Draft for the Computerised Information Work Project" was provided in 1985 to clarify the scope of the project.
   

3. Determination of Project Priorities - The development of the Legislators' Interpellation Information System and the Chinese Code Information System were chosen as two pilot projects of the computerised legislative information system.
   

4. Recommendations from the legislators - In order to explain the purpose and progress of our project to legislators as well as to gather their opinions, LIS twice conducted special briefings for legislators in 1986 and 1988. Some valuable views were received for modifying the trend of development.
   

5. Increasing Budgetary Support - Initiated from a budget of NT$2 million (approximately US$72,727) in Fiscal 1986, LIS has increased annually its budget of business. The average budget of LIS for the last eight years (1990-1997) is about NT$76,126,000 (approximately US$2,768,218).
   

6. Recruiting Professional Personnel - Beginning in 1986, the Legislative Yuan has selected many qualified personnel for each technical position.
   

7. Promotion of Information Consumption - The Law Information Center of LIS was created in 1985 to incorporate an international information service, i.e., DIALOG, hoping that through the experience of a well-developed system, users might become accustomed to and appreciate computerised information searching.
   

8. Utilisation of New Technology - knowing the importance of keeping pace with new technologies, employees of LIS are encouraged to improve their professional expertise and knowledge by attending training courses held abroad or locally.

Steps to Establish LEGISIS

After careful planning and preparation the LEGISIS project began implementation in 1986. The work included the following stages:

1. Request for Proposals - In January 1986 the Legislative Yuan announced its computerised information project to more than 100 computer vendors to invite their proposals on the development of this project; 20 vendors submitted the required proposals.

2. Establishment of a Pilot Project - In March 1986, the staff of LIS invited experts and scholars to examine and evaluate those proposals submitted by vendors. Since there was no single vendor who had sufficient previous experience on a similar system, five vendors were chosen. Those vendors then signed a contract for developing the pilot systems, and the Legislative Yuan provided each vendor a grant of NT$200,000 (approximately US$7,272) for their efforts. The purpose of this pilot project was to establish a prototype of LEGISIS within six months.

3. Evaluation and Demonstration - During the period of developing the LEGISIS pilot systems, the staff of LIS assisted by confirming the functional requirements of the system and these system requirements were then set as the criteria for evaluation to be held later on.

4. Installing the System - In October 1987 the host computer and its peripheral devices were installed. In January 1988 the technical transfer and staff training were completed. Meanwhile, the two application systems were developed and introduced for public access in LIS.

5. Environmental and Space Planning - While the pilot computerisation project was in progress, new working spaces were arranged to house the electronic data processing and computer system.

6. Well-organised Computer Center - The Computer Center of the Legislative Yuan, created and well-organised in November 1987, was established to oversee all of the computer applications of the Legislative Yuan.

Setting of LIS

Brief Description of the Legislative Yuan

The parliament of the Republic of China is unicameral, and it is under the one house (one chamber) system. The Legislative Yuan is the highest legislative organ of the state, constituted of popularly elected representatives who serve for three years and are eligible for re-election. The current Legislators were elected in December 1995. The number stands at 164, including the legislators from the Kuo-Ming Tang (Chinese Nationalist Party), the Democratic Progress Party and the Chinese New Party.

In accordance with the constitution, the Legislative Yuan has the following functions and powers:

1. General legislative power;
2. Confirmation of emergency;
3. Hearing reports on administration and revision of government policy;
4. Examination of budgetary bills and audits;
5. Right of consent;
6. Amendment of the Constitution of R.O.C.

The Legislative Yuan holds two sessions each year, and is now in its third tenure. While in session, the whole Yuan meets every Tuesday and Friday. There are twelve Standing Committees and five Special Committees.

The Location of LIS inside the Yuan

Supervised by the Secretary-General of the Legislative Yuan, the Library & Information Service (LIS) is subordinate to the Secretariat. In accordance with Articles 18; 24 and 26 of the Organic Law of the Legislative Yuan, the Secretariat, Accounting Office, Personnel Office and Committee Offices make up the administrative system of the Legislative Yuan. The Secretariat is composed of the Conference Department; Documentation Center; General Affairs Department; Press Office; Library & Information System (LIS) and Stenography Office. The present Director of the Secretariat, Karl Min Ku, is the former Director of LIS.

Founded in 1989, the Legislation Research Service is as independent research unit supervised directly by the Secretary-General and Deputy Secretary-General of the Legislative Yuan. The unit undertakes the study, analysis, evaluation of draft law bills, including budgetary bills, and research for answers to inquiries and translation of materials relating to legislation.2 It is composed of the Draft Law Bills Section, the Budgetary Bills Section and the Translation Section.

In general, the business activities of LIS are associated with the Legislation Research Service including information transmission, document delivery, and related matters.

Relationship with other Law Libraries / Information Sections in Taiwan

Interlibrary cooperation is one of the objectives of LIS. A few years ago, LIS started to establish a cooperative relationship with other law libraries in Taiwan through the Chinese Law Information Association.

Besides, the LEGISIS network has actively build up an extensive network through the dialling system with more than 100 user accounts from government agencies and research institutes around the island, such as, the Office of the President; the Ministry of National Defense; Taipei City Council; Information Section of the Mainland Affairs Council, the Executive Yuan; the Central Bank of China; Institute for Information Industry; Institute for National Policy Research, as well as the Law School Library of the National University of Taiwan, and so on. Resource sharing is formally in operation.

Organization and Staffing of LIS

Organizational Structure

Library & Information SERVICE (LIS)

• The Library (formerly the Department of Compilation)
• The Law Information Center (established in 1985)
• The Computer Center (operated in 1987)
• The Newspaper Clipping Center (started in 1989)

Each Unit of LIS

1) The Library:

Functions:

1. acquisition of books and subscriptions to periodicals, newspapers, microfilms, CD-ROMs and other AV materials.
   
2. classification and cataloging of collections.
   
3. management and binding of periodical publications.
   
4. maintenance and operation of the library automation system.
   
5. inventory control.

2) The Law Information Center:

Functions:

1. maintenance and operation of LEGISIS.
   
2. research and development of the legislative databases in Chinese and English.
   
3. building research collections of social sciences mainly in the field of law.
   
4. bibliographies and indexes indexing related reference materials.
   
5. documentation of the publications related to LEGISIS.

3) The Computer Center:

Functions:

1. system research and development of LEGISIS.
   
2. management of the LEGISIS network.
   
3. maintenance of the host computers and the peripheral equipment.
   
4. promotion of office automation in the Legislative Yuan.
   

4) The Newspaper Clipping Center:

Functions:

1. daily news clipping services.
   
2. maintenance and operation of the legislative news information system.
   
3. documentation of the publications related to the newspaper clippings and related materials.
   
4. microfilm production of the newspaper clippings.
   
5. production of individual news file for each legislator.

Staffing and Computer Training

As of 1996, the seventy-four staff members in LIS are classified into three groups: twenty-two are authorised by the organised law (among them, eight are technicians and five are office workers); fifty are employed by contract and two are part-time workers.
For the sake of introducing computer knowledge and information technology in the Legislative Yuan, the Computer Center regularly conducts seminars on computer training for the staff members of the Legislative Yuan and legislators' aids. On-the-job training for staff of LIS is also focused on new information and communication fields.

Information and Primary Research Functions

In the past few years, the LIS of the Legislative Yuan has developed the legislative information service to provide instant and up-to-date information on a wide range of activities to legislators. So far, the achievements of LIS include to collect and distribute appropriate information to legislators in support of their legislative and representative functions, as well as to build a solid legislative information system in the Legislative Yuan.

LIS conducts information and primary research functions, i.e., the system has been considered as the support unit for policy-making and legislation. The importance of legislative information is evident in an open society, since it is the means of communication between the government and the general public.

Library Collections and Other Resources

Size of the Collection

An important feature of LIS is that its collection is composed of many multimedia materials. Books on law and politics make up the core collection in conjunction with other related subject matter. Aside from the material listed below, the staff of LIS also gather AV materials, computer diskettes and newspaper clippings, and so on.

All of the Chinese collections are classified according to the Chinese Classification Scheme; foreign collections are classified according to the Dewey Decimal Classification.

Item	Amount	Total
Book	Chinese - 91,714 vol. Japanese/Korean - 2,602 vol. English - 19,074 vol.	113,390 volumes
Periodical	Chinese - 479 titles Japanese/Korean - 31 titles English - 191 titles	701 titles
Newspaper	Chinese - 74 titles Japanese/korean - 6 titles English - 10 titles.	90 titles
Microform	Microfiche - 258 titles Microfilm - 33 titles.	291 titles
CD-ROM	English - 27 titles Chinese - 3 titles.	30 titles

Major Characteristics of the Collection

The following six characteristics of the collection demonstrate the major characteristics of LIS.

1. Specialized subject-oriented reference collections. This group contains statistics and graphic guidance. These collections contain references, such as encyclopedias, congressional reference materials, Who is Who, compilations, directories, yearbooks and statistics collections.

2. Newspaper clippings and related materials. Important Legislative headline news and editorials are clipped from foreign and domestic newspapers, then classified, copied and filed to provide readers with the most current news and commentary.

3. Selective Dissemination of Information (SDI). This involves selecting and compiling articles about timely topics and issues from many domestic newspapers and periodicals relating to public opinion, such as policy planning and political events.

4. Publications from political parties and non-government institutions, including public comments exchanged between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan, reports about diplomacy, economics, society and women's situation in Taiwan, etcetera.

5. Official gazettes and semi-official publications. LIS regularly displays official gazettes, proceedings and legislative agendas of the Legislative Yuan, as well as other official and semi-official publications from other government branches. It also collects other governmental publications from the United States of America, Japan, the European Community, and others.

6. Parliamentary publications. Parliamentary publications from many countries are collected through exchange and gift, such as Standing Rules, congressional records/proceedings, and congressional brochures, and so on. It helps legislators to understand legislative developments and trends from a global perspective.

Reading Areas

LIS occupies 1,201 square meters in total. It is located in one of the parliamentary buildings (the Chun-Hsien Building) with other departmental offices and committee offices. The location of LIS is within a short distance from the main parliamentary building, the Assembly Hall of the Legislative Yuan. The location of each working unit is as follows:

1. The Library is located in the first basement of the Chun-Hsien Building where there is a large reading area.

2. The Law Information Center is located on the third floor of the Chun-Hsien Building where reference desks and the reference collection are located.

3. The Computer Center is located on the third floor of the Chun-Hsien Building. The computer equipment is installed in the computer room.

4. The Newspaper Clipping Center is located on the second floor of the Chun-Hsien Building where the open-shelved newspaper clippings are held.

Services and Products

Services and Products Offered by LIS

1) The Library:

• General Reading Services: To provide open shelf and photocopy services. Displaying books, periodicals and newspapers that are available to readers for browsing and reproduction.

• Book Circulation Services: The circulation desk in the Library takes charge of the checking out service for the entire library collection.

• OPAC (On line public access catalogue): Readers may connect to the OPAC system of the Legislative Yuan Library for on-line retrieval of information through their own terminals.

• New Book Announcement Service: The new book catalogue regularly announces new book arrivals in the Library.

2) The Law Information Center:

• Legislative Reading Service: To provide open-shelf services, reference services and photographic services to readers.

• Legislative Reference Inquiry Services: The full-time reference librarians of the Law Information Center are responsible for the information retrieval and document delivery services at the reference desk.

• LEGISIS Retrieval Service: To provide access to domestic information systems and answer legal inquiries. A brief introduction to the eight sub-systems of LEGISIS follows:

  1) LEGISIS - The Legislative Electronic Bulletin Board System (known as Bulletin).

  To provide the most up-to-date information on the parliament, including Legislative Yuan meetings, important events in Taiwan, rules of sitting in and observing Legislative Yuan meetings, visiting rules and service information, and so on.

  2) LEGISIS - The Legislators' Interpellation Information System (known as Interpellation).

  To offer computerised information retrieval to interpellations about administrative policy, general budget planning and execution with multiple access points. The system contains in its database updated records as well as retrospective records from 1984. The database, which has many access points, can be searched by date, subject, name, and so on. The upgraded version of the system was formally launched in 1995. This newest version provides up to 16 access points and can be combined for Boolean logic (AND, OR, NOT) searching.

  3) LEGISIS - The Chinese Code Information System (known as Codes).

  To input legislated laws (more than six hundred) ratified by the Legislative Yuan in the past years, and to constantly update the system. In addition, retrieval of related and alleged codes can give users a chance to make cross references. There is also a printed form of service, namely, statistics of codes enacted, amended or repealed.

  4) LEGISIS - The Chinese Code Amendment Information System (known as Amendments).

  To enable access to all laws amended by the Legislative Yuan since 1970, the year when the government promulgated the Central Codes Standard. The information in this system is organised according to the main reason for the amendment, the procedure of the amendment, and the text of the amended articles. This is the "sister system" of the Chinese Code Information System.

  5) LEGISIS - The Legislative Literature Information System (known as Literature).

  To establish a bibliographic database of articles from periodicals and research papers since 1986 in the fields of law, economics, finance, public administration, and so on. The system contains several access points, including categories, subjects, keywords, authors, journal titles, and so on. In addition, the reproduction of the retrieved paper is provided through compact discs.

  6) LEGISIS - The Legislative News Information System (known as News).

  To display the collection of clippings from 15 local daily and evening papers. This system provides on-line retrieval of important political events, records of the legislature, development in the Legislative Yuan, administrative policies of the Executive Yuan, and current news. There are two retrieval mechanisms: "menu" and "command". "Menu" is used by beginners, while " command" is used by the staff of LIS.

  7) LEGISIS - The Legislative Record Information System (known as Record).

  To track the records of legislators during session meetings and committee meetings of the whole Yuan. The name of the legislator, the meeting and session number, date, subject, category, keyword, and so on, can be used as access points to find out the desired information. The system provides three modes of searching (menu, command and statistics) and may provide dozens of various reports. A PC version of this system is available.

  8) LEGISIS - The Legislative Yuan Library OPAC (On-line Public Access Catalogue) System (known as OPAC).

  To cover the entire library collections in the system featuring the new book announcement service, personal circulation records, on-line ordering and periodical records, and so on. Formally launched in 1995, it is the most recent online system among the LEGISIS.

• International Information Retrieval Service: To connect to DIALOG, LEXIS-NEXIS and INTERNET in order to obtain a wide variety of information for legislators.

• CR-ROM Retrieval Services: The CD-ROMs which are available in the Law Information Center include LISA, PAIS, Dissertation Abstracts On-disc, Congressional Masterfile, Statistical Masterfile, InfoTrac, WILSONDISC, Federal Register, Multilingual Dictionary, Computer Select, Compton's Multimedia Encyclopedia, Register of Chinese Business, and Directory of Chinese International and Business Regulations, Countries of the World, as well as Chinese Periodical Articles Index, and so on.

• Legislative Microfilm Services: There are about 291 microfilm titles in this catalog, including newspapers, statistical reports, law reviews, GPO's Publications, official gazettes of the government, US CODE, US Statutes At Large, Congressional Records, and so on.

• Current Awareness Services: It contains the indexes and abstracts of foreign legal periodicals, research papers, and so on, and lists the new books in the library.

• Selective Dissemination of Information (SDI) Services: It assembles data focusing on 'hot' social issues, bill amendments, and political events.

• Legislative Decision Support Services: It collects the legislative history, law reviews, index of debates and bibliographies related to a particular bill pending in the current session to provide information support to legislators.

• Publication Exchange Services: To exchange the publications of LIS with other parliamentary libraries all over the world.

3) The Computer Center:

• Network User Assistance Service: To offer technical support to the users of the LEGISIS and to maintain the security of the system.

• Office Automation Assisted Development Service: To develop hardware and software standards for the office automation system in the Legislative Yuan according to the specific requirements of each office.

• Computer Training and Promotion: To conduct computer seminars for users, such as, the usage of the COMWAVE fax data software through the fax-modem, INTERNET, WINDOWS, MS-DOS, the Chinese input method, applied software packages and word processing software, and so on.

4) The Newspaper Clipping Center:

• Newspaper Clipping Reference Services: To compile legislative news extracted from 15 daily and evening newspapers. It can be divided into four categories: the background of enacted bills, administration reports, bill tracking information, and current events. Duplicated copies are available in the Center.

• Legislative News Information Retrieval Services: To provide timely and effective on-line news information services covering important political, parliamentary, and legal news to legislators.

• Newspaper Clipping Microfilm Services: To distribute the legislative news publications, i.e., the Chinese Legislative News Review Index and the Chinese News Review Series to legislators, libraries, government bodies, and academic societies.

Research Services

Sponsored by the Asia Foundation from 1986 to 1989, LIS had published almost 50 legislative research papers concerning debatable issues for a variety of bills, such as, capital punishment, inspection and elimination of slums, criminal law, basic labor standard, labor-management disputes, organ transplant law, wild life preservation law, environment protection law, fair trade law, consumer rights, public bank management law, trade law, artificial reproduction law, coastal ecological preservation, and the jurisdiction of oceanic coastal states, local self-government, public meetings and demonstration, information protection law, judicial law, factory management guidance and occupational hazard, labor contracts law, public calamities prevention and treatment, video taping law, standing rules for meetings, the Senate of France, the Korean governmental organization, the national security law of the US, the national retirement law of Singapore, and the articles of the period of communist rebellion, and so on.

The Publications of LIS

The resources and publication chain provided by LIS consist of twenty different kinds of publications. These publications, which are distributed to legislators periodically, are the result of legislative analysis for tracking bills and of readers' interests. A summary of each publication follows:

1. Newsletter of Books and Documentation (quarterly): This Newsletter is an institutional publication announcing the information activities of LIS, including new services and policies, new collections, newly introduced foreign codes, statistics, and bibliographies of other document services, and so on. (The latest issue : no.50, May 1996).

2. Chinese Legislative News Review Index (monthly): This index provides news items including the status and criticism of the bill, public opinion, and the statements of legislators, and so on. (The latest issue : vol.10 no.6, July 1996).

3. Chinese Legislative News Review Series (irregular): This review collects all the news items, law reviews and special reports, and so on, under a current topic. (The latest issue: May, 1996).

4. Selective Dissemination of Information Series (bi-monthly): It assembles articles from chapters of monographs, proceedings and reports, which focus on 'hot' issues, bill amendments and political events. (The latest issue: May, 1996).

5. Legislative Decision Support Service (monthly): Each issue collects the legislative history, law review, index of debates and bibliographies related to a particular pending bill in the current session to provide information support to legislators. (The latest issue: no.75 June, 1996).

6. Index to Legal Periodicals (irregular): It collects summaries of legal periodicals, which have been briefly translated from English and Japanese law reviews.

7. Code Resource Pathfinder (bimonthly): This reading list maps out all the possible ways and available materials for those who are searching information about a particular code. (The latest issue: no.48, June 1996).

8. Index to Chinese Legislative Literature (bimonthly): It is a bibliographic list of Chinese periodical articles on finance, education, economics, and sociology, and so on, with annual bound editions. (The latest issue: vol.6, no.3, June 1996).

9. Code and Reference Book Catalog (irregular): It is a bibliographic list of reference materials and code collections within LIS. (The latest edition: 5th ed., February, 1993).

10. Gazette, Proceeding and Serial Catalog (irregular): It is a bibliographic list of all official gazettes, proceedings and serial collections within LIS. (The latest edition: 3rd ed., 1990).

11. The Legislative Yuan Library Catalog (irregular): This bibliographic list contains all the monographs, periodicals, codes and every kind of governmental gazette proceedings, and so on, in LIS. (The latest edition: 2nd ed., June 1993).

12. Introduction to Library and Information Services (irregular): This brochure describes how LIS operates and introduces the variety of services offered by LIS, such as the reference service, the reporting service, and the compilation service, and so on. (The latest edition: 1996 edition).

13. LEGISIS Thesaurus (irregular): Printed in a Chinese-English bilingual edition, it is a comprehensive subject guide focusing on the social sciences, particularly law, economics, politics, and sociology, and so on. By using the LEGISIS Thesaurus as a reference guide, one may expect to achieve a higher precision rate in the outcome of searching for information and maximize performance in an information sharing system. (The latest edition: 4th ed., June, 1996).

14. Selective Abstracts of US Congressional Records (irregular): Categorised into eight broad subjects, it contains more than five hundred abstracts of Senate and House bills from the Congressional Records of the United States. (The latest edition: 2nd ed., 1994).

15. Subjects Guide to Chinese Code (irregular): Classified by many subjects, it provides the entire content of the ROC laws which were enacted by the Legislative Yuan and promulgated by the President. (The latest edition 1st ed., 1991).

16. [No entry]

17. Collection of Interpellation Records (irregular): It is the on-line edition of the legislators' individual interpellation records. Several kinds of statistical printouts are offered by the Legislators' Interpellation Information System. (The latest edition: 1st ed., the 1st Tenure Term 79th-84th Session, Feb. 1987-Jan. 1990).

18. Legislative Microfilm Catalog (irregular): This catalog lists the 291 microfilm titles in the collection. The bibliographic record of the item includes microfilm title, compiler, producer, coverage, and remarks, and so on. (The latest edition: 2nd ed., 1994).

19. Index of Legislative record (triennial): It assembles the legislative records and the records of debate, including committee reports and indexes of legislative history. (The latest edition: the 2nd Tenure Term, 1st-6th Session, April 1996).

20. User's Guide to DIALOG and LEXIS-NEXIS (irregular): Based on DIALOG (KNIGHT-RIDDER) and LEXIS-NEXIS information services, it introduces the coverage of data bases, the searching method and the billing policy, and so on. (The latest edition: 2nd ed,. June 1996).

Statistics of the Information Services

1) Statistical Table of the Legislative Information Service:

YEAR	The Number of Services Rendered	The Number of Users
1991	76,022	23,807
1992	31,306	23,722
1993	65,962	55,129
1994	65,632	53,636
1995	59,515	46,234

2) Statistical Table of the Uses of LEGISIS (through WAN and remote dial-up terminals):

i) Period: 1993/01/01 - 1993/12/31

Total: 19,236

ii) Period: 1994/01/01 - 1994/12/31

Total: 18,446

iii) Period: 1995/01/01 - 1995/12/31

Total: 18,162

iv) Period: 1996/01/01 - 1006/06/30

Total: 10,029

Book Loan	1994/07 - 1995/06	1995/07 - 1996/06
Books borrowed	11,421	10,102
Books returned	10,199	7,414
Users of the service	24,375	25,933

Readers and General User Groups of LEGISIS

1. Legislators and their aids: At present there are 164 legislators. Each of them has six government-paid aids. From their individual offices, they have on-line access to LEGISIS, and so do the offices of the three major parties, namely, the Kuo-Ming Tang, the Democratic Progress Party, and the Chinese New Party.

2. The staff of the Legislative Yuan: To help with legislative procedures, the staff of the Legislative Yuan also use LEGISIS to retrieve information. In total, there are 88 ports connected to the host computer.

3. Users outside of the Legislative Yuan: Up to now, there are 83 institutes and more than 100 user accounts from government agencies, research foundations, universities, and members' constituencies. Through this connection, information sharing and exchange is more than a theory.

4. Information professionals: In the Law Information Center, there are several information professionals who will provide information retrieval service on request. The people in this group were the first to use LEGISIS and are also responsible for its promotion and for training.

   Different groups of users have their own distinctive information consumption needs and habits. Therefore, their utilisation of the database will not be the same. If we study the use of LEGISIS in each group, we can find out what their requests are and probably adjust our information development policy.

Developments in Automation

Computer Hardware

To fully exploit the benefits and convenience of combining legislation and information, LIS has actively focused on expanding the available computer hardware.

1. Computer mainframes: such as a VAX7630 mainframe, a VAX8530 mainframe and a back up mainframe.

2. PCs and workstations: more than 200 monitors and workstations have been installed in the legislators' offices.

3. Computer equipment for each legislator: IBM compatible PC 486SX-25, with 8MB RAM, 120 MB and 1.2 GB Hard Disk, 1.44 MB and 1.2 MB Disk Drive, a fax modem. Software: DOS 6.0; Chinese Windows; SPE (Word Processing Software). Printer: Fujitsu Dl 1150 dot matrix printer with colour kit.

The Network System of the Legislative Yuan

About 83 ports belonging to government agencies and the research institutes of this country connect to the host computer, for example:

Office of the President
Bureau of Comprehensive Planning
Government Information Office
Council Labor Affairs, the Executive Yuan
Council for Cultural Planning and Development, the Executive Yuan
Management Information Center of the Ministry of Transportation and Communication
Library of Providence University
Academia Sinica
Department of Information Systems
Taiwan Power Company
Yuantze Institute of Technology
Research, Development and Evaluation Committee of the Executive Yuan
Chinese New Party Headquarters
National Chi Nan University
Ming Chuan College
Energy Committee, the Ministry of Economic Affairs
Campaign Research Center, National Cheng Chi University
National Central Library
Taxation, the Ministry of Finance
Council for Economic Planning and Development, the Executive Yuan
Congressional Observe Foundation
The Administrative Section of the Public Television Station
The Vocational Assistance Commission for Retired Servicemen, and legislators' constituencies around the island.

Computerized Information Activities

1. Information Policy of LIS: LIS planned its computerization in 1984, and prepared a budget in 1986. The host computer was installed in 1987 and formally began to operate in March 1988. Up to the present, eight large information systems have been completed and some others are planned. In the past few years, "centralised processing, centralised service" was the development policy of LIS. Its accomplishment under the policy was highly recognized by both domestic and foreign information specialists. Presently, the Computer Center has built up a wide area network (WAN) among legislators' offices by means of a dial-up system. And with the new policy of "centralized processing, distributed service", LIS is ready to expand its services.

2. Access to the Internet through TANet (Taiwan Academic Network) run by the Ministry of Education started in July 1994. The First and Second buildings of legislators' offices have recently been connected to the Internet through their modems.

3. Maintain the eight sub-systems of the LEGISIS, and expand the network system.

4. Continue developing connections with overseas information retrieval systems, such as DIALOG, LEXIS-NEXIS and the Internet, and others.

Office Automation in the Legislative Yuan

To develop hardware and software standards for the office automation system in the Legislative Yuan according to the specific requirements of each office. The following systems have been completed in the past few years: the Accounting System, the Official Vehicle Management System, the Assets Management System, the Personnel System, the Document Audit System, the Visitor's System, the Computer Equipment Management System, the Training Record System, the Mailing Label System, and the Statistics of Legislators' Attendance System, and so on.

Important Developments in LIS

Recent Trends

Generally speaking, each parliament in the world has established its unique organizational structure, the same as each parliamentary library in the countries around the world. The growth of parliamentary libraries nowadays depends heavily upon the influence of nations' democratization, the operation of its cabinet government and the perfection of Members' support system.

Before 1990, legislators lacked their own office areas inside the Legislative Yuan, and did not have any assistants to help them. But things have changed only a few years later. Now the First and the Second Buildings of Legislators' Offices offer each legislator a research unit for their individual use. At least six government -paid aids help each legislator. So we could estimate that more than a thousand aids hired by the legislators as such form the basic user group of LIS's service and of the LEGISIS network.

The interactive relationship between users and the LIS staff provides the impetus for LIS to serve the legislators and their aids. Therefore, we should stress the importance of the interactive user-librarian relationship for the purpose of satisfying the information requests received from the legislators and their aids. This interaction could be regarded as a trend of LIS development and will expand from the Legislative Yuan through the network system to every network user to support their legislative work and, most important of all, to promote international cooperation among the parliamentary libraries of Asia and the Pacific region. The Association of Parliamentary Librarians of Asia and the Pacific (APLAP) has already become an organization for common legislative information development that is supported by a variety of legislatures of Asia and the Pacific region. The present writer currently serves as the President of APLAP.

New Products and Services

The following two information systems are scheduled to be completed within a year:

1. The News Image Information System: To be upgraded from the Legislative News Information System, it will be designed for a multi-media database service with an image base. The input/output devices may include voice, image and graphic materials, and so on.

2. The Full-Text Gazettes Retrieval System: This will provide advanced retrieval to the full-text format of the Legislative Yuan Gazettes. The idea for this system originated from the Legislative Record Information System.

As the network system of the Legislative Yuan, a concrete plan, which will be implemented in the next two or three years, can be outlined: To build an open network system based on the present WAN, i.e., an electronic inter-communication system through the telecommunication network. It will transmit BBS and E-Mail messages to remote users. The Yuan network and the Legislative Bulletin Board System will be two pilot systems for the development of this project.

Services to be Reinforced

In view of the future, the services provided by LIS in the Legislative Yuan have to be oriented towards political trends, based on public opinion, that countries around the world are now actively emphasizing. Under such considerations, we should make sure that the six developmental information measures listed below are continuously and effectively exercised:

1. Actively collect all kinds of legislative data and resources.

2. Effectively improve information services and broaden their scope.

3. Improve the quality and contents of the report publications.

4. Promote computer-processing and telecommunication networks toward an integrated and environment-wide development including organizing a virtual-reality library.

5. Invite scholars and specialists to participate in research work.

6. Promote international information cooperation and communication.

The Legalization of the LIS Structure

Considering the circumstances of LIS from a legal aspect, the main obstacle is that LIS does not have the status of a department in the organic law of the Legislative Yuan. It is a task of utmost importance to establish a responsible organ through legislation which would be in charge of library and information operations. Just as the other parliamentary libraries of the world, such as the Library of Congress in the US, the National Diet Library of Japan, and the National Assembly Library of the Republic of Korea, have demonstrated, a responsible organ is an indispensable part of information development. Only through such an organ can this information and research service development program have authentic, systematic and historical meaning.

The planning of relocation and reconstruction of the Legislative Yuan is in process. It is our duty to carry on the mission of LIS, and promote its computerized information activities. The present state of LIS certainly will be the foundation for the development of tomorrow. A brand-new look of LIS is under deliberation.

The library and information environment in the Legislative Yuan has experienced an extremely critical period during the past ten years with its service, productivity, and system successfully improved and upgraded under the developmental program. Many new services, publications and systems have been introduced, published and created, all designed towards a well-conceptualized, integrated information and research service environment that will meet the political reform needs of the 1990's and beyond. As we have shown, from the many positive accomplishments the computerized information service has implemented so far, added by the increasing service statistics, it is clear that the program of information service has proved itself to be effective and farsighted and that it favors not only our short-term improvements but will also have a long-term influence over the entire information development of the Legislative Yuan and Taiwan as a whole. The positive responses from people, both here and throughout the international community, are also proof of the value of LIS's existence.

Almost at the same time, people in Taiwan began to play a more active role in our nation's legislative work. This, in turn, has had great consequences in promoting the legislative role and its power. The Legislative Information Service of LIS came into existence as people increasingly became aware of the importance of the quality of legislation and its effectiveness. This has certainly had a positive influence on making legislation more suitable and favorable to the people of this society. And as the facts have shown the improvement of LIS has gained unanimous support from both the ruling party and the opposition parties, and has become an important blueprint for the development of our legislative information environment from now on.

LIS has joined several prestigious library and information organizations, such as IFLA, ASIS and APLAP. By attending the annual conference, we come to understand the worldwide trend for the development of the library and information profession and thus enhance our standard of parliamentary librarianship. With the expanded information service which we provide and the ever-increasing number of users, we are dedicated to improving the legislative information system to provide a better quality service, as well as a more efficient service. We hope to support the legislators of the third tenure term with abundant legislative information and establish an objective and independent worldwide information supplying system to promote our national democracy to a higher level.