Journal of Librarianship and Information Science

In order to fulfil its central role in the British democratic process Parliament needs information: precise. accurate and sometimes complicated and specialized information over an ever-widening subject area. and which often is required rapidly for the purpose of immediate debate. The House of Commons Library has since 1946 played a major part in the provision of official, politically objective information and research services for the House of Commons and its 635 Members, and the present article outlines some of the more recent developments in these services. Sections on the Library's terms of reference and on its current organization and staffing are followed by consideration of the Parliamentary (or Library) Division and of the Research Division respectively. The author concludes with a personal view on the distinctive role of parliamentary librarianship today within the library profession generally.

A survey of subject specialization in UK university libraries was made in April 1981. Replies were received in the form of letters, from which quotations are made liberally. The evolution of subject specialization is traced and views on the term 'subject specialist described. Each library is classified in one of five categories - functional, dual, hybrid, 3-tier, subject divisional - according to the form of subject specialization (if any) practised. The range of functions commonly performed on a subject basis is considered. Factors which influence the adoption and implementation of subject specialization are discussed. These include relations with library users, work satisfaction and promotion prospects, the availability of suitably qualified staff and the relevance of subject qualifications, tensions between subject and functional activities, and the significance of automation and economic considerations. Most of the reservations expressed about subject specialization were practical rather than ideological.

A recent British Library Report dealing with research activity in library management criticized British Librarians for being reactionary in the field of management as compared with their colleagues in the United States. This article, which deals only with public librarians, maintains that the report fails to draw sufficient attention to the very diflerent background against which British public librarians operate.

Despite the growing importance of second-hand material, partly as a result of the economic climate. the need to subject desiderata files in academic libranes to periodic review has been virtually neglected in Bntlsh library literature. A mechanism for such 'house-keeping (and with additional potential as a searching tool), based on limited computenzation, is described together with the diplomacy demanded by a 'purge.