The Index to the House of Commons Parliamentary Papers offers instant access to information on nearly 200 years of parliamentary papers. It’s the only cumulative index to the period. The information for the 19^th century is taken from the Chadwyck-Healey Subject Catalogue of the House of Commons Parliamentary Papers, 1801-1900, by Peter Cockton.

For the 20^th century, the Index on CD-ROM combines the HMSO General Alphabetical Indexes covering 1900 to 1979 and the Parliamentary On-Line Information Service (POLIS) database from 1979.

As a major enhancement, new broad subject terms (categories) have been introduced, in addition to the existing HMSO/POLIS terms.

The Index offers precise and speedy access to the Papers through a choice of search terms:

• Subject category
• Subject heading
• Subject keyword
• Paper title
• Paper type
• Paper number
• Title keyword
• All keywords
• Session
• Chairmen of committees/author
• Year

A 19^th-century index and a 20^th/21^st-century index are available.