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Researching Canadian Legislation & Parliamentary Materials: Ontario

Ontario Legislation and Parliamentary Materials

This section of the guide provides information about Ontario's legislative and parliamentary materials. Other Canadian provinces and territories are covered in the "Provinces/Territories" tab.

See also: Bill Tracking/Updating Legislation

Ontario Legislative Library catalogue

For historical materials see the Historical Statutes and Legislation

Statutes and Regulations

Statutes are the final result of the legislative process, when Bills pass the final reading and receive Royal Assent to become law.

Bills

Bills are draft laws that are introduced to the Legislature to be debated, voted upon, and potentially become black-letter law. However, not all Bills eventually become law. This is where you can find all bills - including the ones that did not become law.

Legislative Research

The Legislative Library and Legislative Research of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario provide MPPs, their staff, and legislative committees with confidential, non-partisan research and analysis on request. They also prepare research papers on key public policy topics of interest to parliamentarians.

Research papers are intended to assist MPPs and their staff with their work. However, select research papers are available to the public. Review these resources at the link below.

Hansard (Debates)

Hansards are the text of the debates that are conducted in the legislature.

Historical Materials

Some historical research requires visiting the library in person to use some of the print copies of the legislation.  However, a number of digital initiatives are now available on the Internet.

See also Ontario section under the Historical Statutes and Legislative Materials tab.