Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) - Australia (Commonwealth)
Committee Transcripts
1901-
Committees are set up to investigate and report their findings to Parliament and comprise a stated number of members from each side of the house, with government members being in the majority. Committees may be Standing or Select Committees, and may also be Joint Committees of both Houses.
The first Committees of the Commonwealth Parliament were "domestic" committees, such as the Library and Printing Committees, formed in 1901; select committees were also formed from the beginning, and in 1913 the first joint statutory committees were formed: the Public Works Committee and the Public Accounts Committee. The present committee system did not evolve until the 1970, however, when several Senate Standing Committees were established.
Committee Transcripts, also called Hansards, debates, minutes, or proceedings of evidence, may be published separately or with the report of the committee.
Some committee reports and evidence are to be found only in the various Parliamentary Papers series, and some evidence for earlier decades is to be found in the general Hansard.
To find committee transcripts, the most important step is first to establish the exact name of the committee. This can be done from the following sources: Parliamentary handbooks; government directories; general Hansards. Then consult the library catalogue under the name of the committee or legislature as organisation author, to find the call number.
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Committee Transcripts is a Current Series of Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) - Australia (Commonwealth)
Parliamentary debates of the Australian Senate and House of Representatives were issued in combined volumes from 1901 until March 1953. From September 1953 the debates were split, and were issued as the House of Representatives Hansard (bound in green from 1962) and the Senate Hansard (bound in red from 1962).
Indexes are at the back of the bound volumes. There are separate Indexes to speeches and Indexes to Subjects. The latter uses broad subject categories such as Bills, Committees, and Questions on Notice.
Since the commencement of the 44th Parliament (12 November 2013) Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) are available online only.