Now that we’ve explored finding Standing Committee information on the Web, how do we access the paper versions? We will be examining the following documents:

• Minutes of Proceedings: the official record of the committee
• Evidence: verbatim transcripts of the meetings
• Reports: the final results of business or study completed by the Standing Committee, presented to the House of Commons

As in Part 1, we will use the Standing Committee dealing with the Environment as our example. AMICUS, the Library and Archives Canada catalogue, is our access point and we will use the Advanced Search so that all searching options are available.

Continuing with the environmental theme for documents published in 1986, search using the following:

1. In the Name Keyword field, type standing committee inside quotation marks.
2. In a second Name Keyword field, type environment.
3. Type 1986 in the Any Keyword field,* then press Enter.

*Note: Start with the date in the Any Keyword field, as the session may span several years and you’ll have a better chance of retrieving relevant records. Or, you can omit the date completely and sort your results by date.

The results list shows:

• the report produced that year, Forest Resources and Industries in Eastern Canada
• two microform versions of the Minutes of Proceedings and Evidence
• the paper version of the Minutes of Proceedings and Evidence for the session

Most importantly, we discover that the name of the committee in 1986 was the Standing Committee on Environment and Forestry.

The catalogue record for the report follows. Key information for retrieval has been highlighted.

AMICUS No. 6662440 Monograph
NLC COPIES: C.O.P. – COP.C.XC50 – Add specific Parliament, session and issue no. / Ajouter la législature, la session et la livraison désirée
NAME(S): *Canada. Parliament. House of Commons. Standing Committee on Environment and Forestry
TITLE(S): Forest resources and industries in Eastern Canada : first report / Standing Committee on Environment and Forestry
PUBLISHER: [Ottawa] : The Committee, 1986.
DESCRIPTION: ii, 95, [17, 18], 107, ii p.; 27 cm.
SERIES: Canada. Parliament. House of Commons. Standing Committee on Environment and Forestry. Minutes of proceedings and evidence of the Standing Committee on Environment and Forestry = Procès-verbaux et témoignages du Comité permanent de l’environnement et des forêts. 1984-85-86, issue no. 7
NOTES: Text in English and French with French text on inverted pages.
“June 1986”.
Includes bibliographical references.
RELATIONSHIPS: Canada. Parlement. Chambre des communes. Comité permanent de l’environnement et des forêts Ressources et industries forestières de l’est du Canada :. [Ottawa] : Le Comité, 1986.

You’ll notice that the record specifies that you should “Add specific Parliament, session and issue no.” This is required for the physical retrieval of these publications at Library and Archives Canada.

Where do we find this information?

Specific Parliaments are listed on PARLINFO. In this case, 1986 spans both the 1st and 2nd sessions of the 33rd Parliament. If we were to order the report released in June 1986 (see highlighted Note in record above), we would request the 33rd Parliament, 1st Session (1984.11.05-1986.08.28), Issue no. 7 (see highlighted Series note in record above).

And so ends our brief introduction to searching the Standing Committees!