The Nineteenth Century House of Commons Parliamentary Papers has been purchased by JISC Collections and is available free of charge to UK Higher and Further Education institutions and Research Councils.
Institutions now have free online access to over 6,000 volumes and 4 million pages of documents from core 19th century official Parliamentary publications including debates, proceedings and reports of their committees and more going back to 1801.
An access fee may apply after 31/10/2011.
Content description
The 19th Century House of Commons Parliamentary Papers contains bibliographic records and searchable full text for over 79,000 papers, amounting to 4.2 million pages, printed between 1801-1900. Accompanying the papers is detailed indexing from Peter Cockton's ’Subject Catalogue of the House of Commons Parliamentary Papers 1801–1900’.
Main subject areas
Multidisciplinary resource, but subject areas include:
- Architecture
- Area Studies (African, Indian, American, Canadian, Asian, Irish)
- Art History
- Economics
- Education
- Geography
- Health and Medicine
- History
- International Studies
- Law
- Literature
- Political Science
- Science and Technology
- Sociology
- Womens and Childrens Studies
Academic level
Undergraduate, Postgraduate and Research.
Date range
1801-1900
Updates
This is a closed collection. However, a small number of pages (less than 500 out of the total of 4.2 million) containing maps and other illustrations were not deemed to be of sufficient quality on the microfiche to digitize. Replacement images will be scanned from print originals and loaded in 2007.
Publisher's selection policy
Before the advent of a fully formed Whitehall departmental system, Parliament was the main source of public information, ordering the publication of papers, returns, reports and evidence on a grand scale. These papers and reports are often fascinating and exhaustive in their detail. In an environment of relatively inexpensive printing, the result was around 5,900 bound volumes and 4.2 million pages of papers for the 19th century alone.
19th Century House of Commons Parliamentary Papers includes digital versions of these sessional papers. It does not include debates (Hansard), the House of Commons Journal, or daily business papers, such as Order papers and Votes and Proceedings. These are outside the scope of a precise application of the term parliamentary papers.
Sessional papers, sometimes called blue books, were required for the work of the House of Commons, providing information on matters of policy and administration, and ordered by the House to be printed. They fall into the following three categories:
Bills – drafts of legislation, to be reviewed through various parliamentary stages. If the Bill passes through these stages, it will become an Act of Parliament.
House Papers – documents resulting from the work of the House and its Committees.
Command Papers – Government papers (from Ministers) conveying information or decisions the Government wishes to draw to the attention of the House, presented by Command of Her Majesty.
Both Houses of Parliament, the Commons and the Lords, produce parliamentary papers. Although House of Commons Parliamentary Papers is a collection of Commons papers, some from the Lords are also included. This is because the Lords often presented papers to the Commons, such as reports prepared by Lords Select Committees. These reports were then included in the House of Commons Papers, and therefore appear in 19th Century House of Commons Parliamentary Papers.
Complementary resources
By subscribing to 18th Century House of Commons Parliamentary Papers, 19th Century House of Commons Parliamentary Papers and 20th Century House of Commons Parliamentary Papers, over 300 years of official parliamentary records can be cross-searched on a single platform.
Cost
JISC has purchased the digitised images of the 19th Century House of CommonsParliamentary Papers (HCPP) on behalf of the UK HE and FE community (including the Research Councils).
There are TWO subscription options available to institutions:
Sub-Licence A:
Institutions can take advantage of online access to the HCPP via ProQuest. This will provide a fully integrated search facility, allowing for the fast retrieval of previously hard-to-find material and, with linking to current content, makes it easy to explore. This option is FREE of CHARGE. The JISC Collections agreement guarantees that there will be NO ACCESS CHARGES for the next five years.
Sub-Licence B:
Institutions can receive the digital content of the HCPP and locally mount the content on a secure network.
This option requires institutions to pay a ONE OFF FEE of £500 + VAT.
N.B All prices are exclusive of VAT.
To find your institution's banding, please see: JISC Banding.
For an explanation of JISC Banding please see the charging explanation.
Subscribe to this agreement until 31 October 2011 and have access to the content via the publisher's platform.
Host this content yourself by making a one-off payment of £500.
The agreement complies with the terms of the JISC Model Licence. Please note that institutions are allowed to deposit learning and teaching objects that incorporate parts of the HCPP into JORUM.
For further details of the JISC Model Licence please refer to the Guide to the JISC Model Licence.
Additional Authorised Users
ProQuest has agreed to extend access to the 19th Century House of Commons Parliamentary Papers to Additional Authorised User groups for purposes as defined below. If you would like to participate, please print out the licence, complete Schedule 2 and return it to the publisher. Contact details are provided on the licence.
- Additional Authorised User licence for educational use. This licence will enable institutions, for an additional fee, to provide access to defined user groups at Partner Organisations for educational purposes only. The Partner Organisation may be within the UK or overseas. Dowload the licence.
- Additional Authorised User licence for commercial use. This licence will enable institutions, for an additional fee, to provide access to defined users in small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) funded by or affiliated to a university for the purposes of commercial research and development. Download the licence.
Functionality and standards compliance
Full text linking
Durable URL Bookmarking
One–click bookmarking allows direct access to frequently used pages with OpenURL links. All works in HCPP, as well as all search and browse screens, feature a ’Durable URL’ button which opens a satellite window containing a durable URL link. These links can be pasted into emails, web pages, reading lists and e–learning systems to allow direct linking for other users from subscribing institutions.
Federated searching
HCPP will become Z39.50 compliant in a future release. Information on how customers can configure their Z39.50 software to search HCPP will become available at the Administrator Resources page http://parlipapers.chadwyck.co.uk/infoCentre/admin/adminresources.jsp.
HCPP is not currently a target for inbound OpenURL linking.
MARC records
MARC records for the HCPP database can be downloaded from the Administrator Resources page, free of charge. MARC records for each work in HCPP are in progress and will become available in 2007.
Metadata standards
Not applicable.
Search options
Keyword(s), Paper title Keyword(s), Subject Keyword(s), Paper Chair/author, Session, Paper Number, Year range. The Search screen also allows users to limit searches by paper type (House of Commons Papers, Command Papers, Bills, Reports, Accounts) or limit searches to papers containing maps/plans, tables/graphs, or photographs/illustrations. Results can be sorted chronologically by session date, alphabetically by title, or by relevance.
All fields support use of a truncation operator (*), Boolean AND/OR/NOT, and proximity operators Near and Followed By (For example, treaty NEAR.5 Netherlands; health FBY.4 housing).
HCPP incorporates Peter Cockton's Subject Catalogue of the House of Commons Parliamentary Papers, 1801-1900. The subject terms can be included in searches or the entire index can be browsed separately from the Browse 19th Century Subject Catalogue tab.
Supporting information can be found in the Information Resources area, including a Guide to Parliamentary Papers, a List of Principal Ministers in Cabinets, an online demo of the database and its features, and a Glossary of terms.
Post-search options
From a list of results, HCPP users can select records and add them to their Marked List or add the search to their own password protected work area - My Archive. From the Marked List or My Archive users can Print, Email and Download records in a variety of formats, i.e. Plain Text, ProCite, EndNote, Reference Manager and RefWorks.
HCPP Search History functionality facilitates re-execution and combination of search sets (AND, OR and NOT).
Document images can be downloaded in their entirety or in part in PDF format, and document pages can be downloaded in TIFF format.
Usage statistics
HCPP usage statistics are modelled as closely as possible on the requirements for web statistics produced by the International Coalition of Library Consortia (ICOLC). Though some changes were necessary because of the nature of the database, the publishers of HCPP have kept to the spirit of the ICOLC requirements.
Customisable usage statistics reports are available to librarians and systems administrators in a password-protected Administrator Resources area within the Information Resources section at http://parlipapers.chadwyck.co.uk/infoCentre/admin/adminresources.jsp.
Authentication
This resource is UK Access Management Federation Compliant. Access can also be via ATHENS.
IP range
Username and Password; Referrer URL
Personalisation of the online resource
Users can create a password protected work area called My Archive. Here they can save searches and records by selecting records and adding them to their Marked List or add them from the Search History.
Librarians can customise the HCPP interface at an institutional level by adding library branding. This is available under Customisation Options from a password-protected Administrator Resources area within Information Resources at http://parlipapers.chadwyck.co.uk/infoCentre/admin/adminresources.jsp.
Accessibility
A number of accessibility features have been implemented in HCPP to make the site more accessible to people with visual, motor or cognitive disabilities. The site complies with WAI Priority 1 accessibility standards and some features also contribute towards compliance with Priority 2 and 3 guidelines. For full details, see http://parlipapers.chadwyck.co.uk/infoCentre/access.jsp
Library support information