Library (Hansard, 21 May 1986)

§ Mr. Biffen

Books held in the House of Commons Library amount currently to approximately 150,000 volumes. The Library is not offered many complimentary copies of books, but is happy to accept those books that may be useful to Members and the Library. In financial year 1985–86 the cost of purchasing new books and pamphlets was £59,965. In each of the last five years the number of books (excluding pamplets) purchased by the Library has been:

	Numbers
1981–82	3,886
1982–83	1,860
1983–84	2,529
1984–85	2,568
1985–86	2,279

There are no plans to expand the area of the Members' Library. However, a substantial part of the Library's services will be moved to the northern section (Nos. 45, 46 and 47) of the new building in Parliament Street, which is planned for completion in 1990. The Members' Library will remain unchanged, but the Library will vacate most of its existing premises in the Norman Shaw buildings and some of its office accommodation in the Palace when this move to the new building takes place. The recommendations of the Services Committee in this respect are contained in paragraphs 8–13 and in appendix II of their third report of 1983–84 (HC571).

In accordance with the recommendation of the Informal Joint Committee on Library and Record Office Storage Accommodation (HC309, 1984–85), it is hoped that some basement storage accommodation under the new conference centre in Broad Sanctuary will be made available to the Library at a future date. The Library is meanwhile following another recommendation of the Informal Joint Committee for continuous systematic weeding and disposal of its out-of-date material.