The term 'legislation' covers both the process of making laws and the documents which are produced as a result of the legislative bodies' decisions. This guide will deal with the documents, including online resources.
Other terms which you may hear in relation to legislation include:
United Kingdom legislation: The Hartley Library has a complete printed collection of English Public and General Acts of Parliament. Acts of the Scottish Parliament since devolution are also held. We have a good, but not complete, set of Local Acts. Our collection of Secondary Legislation (statutory instruments, rules and orders) is extensive. See the box to the right for a selection of online sources.
Other jurisdictions: We have less print material for other jurisdictions and most is historic. Both Westlaw and Lexis Library contain legislation from around the English-speaking world, including Ireland, the USA, Canada, Australia, India and South Africa. There are also good free sources for many jurisdictions which can be located via WorldLII.
There are many sources of online legislation, but the most useful source for your purposes will depend to some extent on what you need. Do you want to see the law as it was passed or do you need to know the current state? Do you simply need the legislation itself or do you want extra information, perhaps explanations or information on related cases and journal articles?
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This link opens in a new windowIf you are looking for older legislation you may need to use print sources. The document below covers some of the research tools you'll need.
... our British Official Publications libguide.
