Searching Official Documentation
Government reports, parliamentary debates (Hansard), legislative sources and other official documentation are all potential impact indicators.
Official publications may:
- indicate impact reflected in court judgements, changes in legislation or policy
- identify the contributions of research and other discipline enquiry to policy developments
- reflect an impact on important issues in the Australian social, cultural or economic environment through debate and discussion in parliament
- establish the importance of research through, programmes, strategies and projects which benefit the community
Locating parliamentary, legal and government information
The Library maintains guides to Parliamentary and Legal Resources. The guides are comprehensive and provide links to many official sources
Law Library Internet & Database guides provide access to primary and secondary legal sources including Legislation, Bills, Case Law, Unreported Judgements and commentary and journal articles http://www.library.usyd.edu.au/libraries/law/freeweblaw.html
The University of Sydney Library Government Guide, provides links to official parliamentary publications and research services. http://www.library.usyd.edu.au/subjects/government/austdocs.html#hansard
Social Policy Guide – wide range of social policy programmes and organisations. http://www.library.usyd.edu.au/subjects/socialwork/socialpolicy.html
Searching Parliamentary Debates (Hansard)
- Federal & State Parliaments provide free access to Hansards and other official parliamentary resources.
- Parliamentary document collections are retrospective and searchable
- The RQF timeframe 2000-2006 is covered by all Federal & State services
Sample search – searching Parlinfo web – Federal Parliamentary search service
Step 1: Go to Library Law or Government Guides or directly to:
http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/
Step 2: Choose one of the following
Search - search on all or select specific collections and individual databases within ParlInfo.
Browse - browse collections and individual databases within ParlInfo without performing a search.
Guided search - step by step process to search ParlInfo for Speeches, Bills, documents, Senate Estimate Hearings, Second Reading Speeches for a Bill, and Biographies of a Senator or Member.
Step 3: enter keywords
Step 4: enter date range for RQF period
Step 5: from the collection dropdown menu choose to search all collections or specific collections. To search hansard choose Chamber and select required publication eg. House of representative hansard.
Step 6 : select search options if required
Step 7: click on the search button and view results.
Results display
Searching for Legal Information
Austlii – provides free internet access to Australasian legal materials including expert witness information for superior courts: Austlii
New South Wales Parliamentary Counsel’s office – official website for New South Wales legislation: Parliamentary Counsel’s office
Lower court information, for example, District Court, Local Court and Magistrates Court information can be found at Lawlex
ComLaw – official source for Federal legislation: ComLaw
Capital monitor - (University of Sydney staff and students only) Provides current and historical legal and political and regulatory information: Capital monitor
Impact indicator - NSW hansard second reading debate
Impact indicator - Austlii case law search
Ongoing support is provided by:
Faculty of Law - Law Library Staff
Business Law - Economics & Business Team, Fisher Library
Socio -legal & policy studies - Social Sciences Team, Fisher Library socialsciences@library.usyd.edu.au