Legislation Index
See basic instructions for filling in a Legislation Index here
When doing bulk imports from a Legislation Index the importer (machine) "reads" the spreadsheet, so be very careful that text is inserted accurately. When copy/pasting, look out for typos, numbers transposed, spaces missing between words in titles, line breaks in titles, that information matches accurately to the source document, etc. It is vitally important that the metadata we capture is accurate, so check, recheck and then check again!
If a Gazette Index has been created for a project, it can be used for research by searching within the index for pieces of legislation needed for the project and also for amendments, repeals or commencements thereto. The basic metadata in the Gazette Index is used when creating the legislation index by copy/pasting from one spreadsheet to the other. The rest of the information needed for the legislation index must be obtained from the source documents.
If there was no need to create a Gazette index, all metadata needed for the legislation index will be obtained from the source documents.
A vital piece of metadata is the commencement date, as this indicates when the piece of legislation is in force and applicable. Often legislation is published but does not commence immediately, this means that it exists but cannot yet be applied.
Regarding how the publication/assent/commencement dates relate to each other, you may need to read the Interpretation Act/Vienna Convention on Treaties, of the relevant region as the relationships between them can differ slightly between countries/regions.
Placeholder dates
If a document has no date (publication/consolidation/assent/commencement), the date 1600-01-01 must be used as a placeholder. This date is used to allow for a document to be imported while the correct date(s) is(are) being sourced.
Unknown commencement date
If a work has commenced, but its commencement date is unknown, enter a date with the year 9999 (eg. 9999-01-01) in the "commencement_date" column.
If a work has not yet commenced, the "commencement_date" column must be left blank.
Last updated
