Category Archives: Official Publications

House of Commons Parliamentary Papers – improved interface

The University has access to the House of Commons Parliamentary Papers database and it is accessible through the library catalogue and the electronic library.  This is a great research resource and it is now migrating to a new platform in order to make searching much easier.

At the moment both the old service and the new service are running – so if you are an experienced user of the old system you have some crossover time in order to become familiar with the new search interface before the old familiar one is switched off.  The old ‘legacy’ interface will continue until March 2016.  Once the transition is complete, the service will be renamed as ProQuest U.K. Parliamentary Papers.

Login to the service from the library catalogue or the electronic library.  and choose the Proquest Government Platform link at the top of the page to view the new interface.

ProquestSome of the improvements introduced under the new platform include:

  • Faster, more intuitive searching
  • Post-search faceting to get to relevant documents
  • Full-text PDFs (rather than individual page images)
  • Bookmarking of search forms
  • Dedicated Search by Number form including searches for bills, Command Papers, and Sessional Paper numbers
  • Dedicated Member search form including search by office, party affiliation, and nation (England, Wales, Scotland etc)

A LibGuide is available to help you make the most of the new interface.  The search syntax  section outlines all the search functions that you can use to frame a search tailored to your research need such as wildcards, phrase searching, and boolean and proximity operators.

If you need any further guidance just get in touch with your .