National Library of Australia - Gateways

ISSN 1443-0568 | no. 69 | June 2004


Document Supply Service and the Parliamentary Library

A colour photograph of Chris Hickey on duty at the Parliamentary Service Desk
Chris Hickey on duty at the Parliamentary Service Desk

The precursor of the National Library was the Commonwealth Parliamentary Library which was set up at the time of Federation in 1901. It was set up with a view to its becoming a national library located in the federal capital and serving the nation. Once the Commonwealth Parliament had moved to Canberra in 1927, the library began to use the term ‘Commonwealth National Library’ when functions were performed that went beyond direct services to Parliament. In 1960 an Act of Parliament set up the National Library of Australia as a statutory body.

The Document Supply Service of the National Library provides material and resources from its own vast collections to the Parliamentary Library to support Parliament in its governance of the nation. As part of its charter, the Document Supply Service undertakes to process all requests from the Parliamentary Library as speedily and efficiently as possible. Requests for material from specific areas of the National Library are routed to those areas by the Document Supply Service officer in charge of the Parliamentary service and delivery times are monitored. A special courier service runs between both libraries at the times of 9 am, 11 am, 2 pm and 4 pm—and at 6 pm on those days when Parliament is sitting. In very urgent cases, the Parliamentary Library will send their own courier to collect material outside these times. Copies are generally sent via the Ariel system but can also be faxed or collected by courier if necessary.

The Parliamentary Library may request and receive a much wider range of material than is normally accessible to the general library community. Due to the diverse range of material that can be borrowed, varying loan periods and conditions apply. For example, whereas hard copy Australian newspapers (the legal deposit copies) are never sent out as part of the normal Interlibrary Loan service, the Parliamentary Library may borrow these if no microfilm copy is available. The loan period for this type of material, or indeed any legal deposit material, is seven days. The Parliamentary Library is also able to borrow, as a one-day loan, reference material that normally never leaves the building.

This is a valued service and the relationship between the two libraries is a very important one.
—Chris Hickey, Document Supply Service

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