Tēnā koe! This page is home to a bunch of documents from New Zealand that come under the ambit of Section 27 of the Copyright Act 1994 (NZ).
These documents are provided initially as scans, which are then passed on to Project Gutenberg's Distributed Proofreaders project, if they haven't been already. Links to PG e-books are provided as they are released.
Section 27(1) basically says there is no copyright (including Crown copyright) in a wide range of court and tribunal decisions, municipal legislation, and parliamentary legislation, debates and reports:
- No copyright exists in any of the following works, whenever those works were made:
- Any Bill introduced into the House of Representatives:
- Any Act as defined in section 4 of the Acts Interpretation Act 1924:
- Any regulations:
- Any bylaw as defined in section 2 of the Bylaws Act 1910:
- The New Zealand Parliamentary Debates:
- Reports of select committees laid before the House of Representatives:
- Judgments of any court or tribunal:
- Reports of Royal commissions, commissions of inquiry, ministerial inquiries, or statutory inquiries.
The other clause, Section 27(2), delayed implementation, so Section 27(1) came into force on April Fool's Day, 2001, thanks to the Copyright Act Commencement Order 2000 (SR 2000/245).
On this page, you will find the documents that have been digitised (including some related non-S27(1) PD documents), the reasons (in addition to the above) for this project, the legal stuff which I ask you read before reading the documents, news on this project and some acknowledgements to those that have helped. Don't want to wade through all that cruft? Want to skip straight to the books, eh? Try the quick list, then.
In response to constructive feedback that the detailed title information later on this page is too messy to casually browse through, here's a quick table to skim through instead. A suggestion on how to use the table follows.
30 November 2006: Oops! The quick list is slightly out of date; some recent additions might not be there. I'll fix it with some luck in the next fortnight. If you can't find what you're looking for here, scroll down to the full listings for each book or use the search text function in your browser. Thanks!
The titles link to detailed title information below. In short, if you don't need scanned images, try to use the PG column links (they're the numbers). The scanned images I provide that are linked to above in the Scans column are facsimiles of the publication, and so the text contained therein is not searchable. However, the Project Gutenberg, or PG, versions, where available, are searchable: use the text search function in your favourite web browser.
The only documents thought of so far, and currently available, are the Report of the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents (1954), aka the Mazengarb Report, Venereal Diseases in New Zealand (1922), and the Judgments of the Court of Appeal of New Zealand on Proceedings to Review Aspects of the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Mount Erebus Aircraft Disaster (1981).
I anticipate putting online other documents, with preference being given to those that can't be easily obtained elsewhere online and those that I can get electronic versions of. The primary selection criteria is academic interest.
The copyright status of each document will be marked. Please respect this, especially if some original editorial content has been added. With some of the titles, discretion is also advised. If you're squeamish on sexual issues, you may wish to reconsider reading these. That said, I believe content on this page is likely to not be illegal or objectionable, as they are previously published government documents of some description!
The last page news was added on 8 January 2005. See below, later on the page. Further news is now being placed in the power house's Section 27(1) page.
So, in addition to these, I may also post scans of documents in the PD that are not covered by S27(1) in the next section of this page.
Read the book using its Gallery album to view it. A zipped file with the original scans will be made available in the new year.
You may also want to read the PG HTML edition of the book. Plain text editions are also available.
Also of interest may be the DNZB entry on Oswald Mazengarb, the inquiry chairperson. Wikipedia entries on the Oswald Chettle Mazengarb and the Mazengarb Report itself may also be of use.
The following year (1955), this report was followed up by another report, the Report of the Juvenile Delinquency Committee.
Update, 2022-05-03: I have a ZIP file of the PNGs that were scanned available!
Read the book using its Gallery album to view it.
This report is currently making its way through the PG Distributed Proofreaders website. Please consider proofreading a page. You'll need to log in (and register first, if you're new) to proof.
Also of interest may be the DNZB entry on Ronald Macmillan Algie, the special select committee chairperson.
This report is a followup to the previous title listed, the Mazengarb Report.
Read the book using its Gallery album to view it. A zipped file with the original scans will be made available in the next six months. I'm aware that the smaller type in the book is potentially unreadable in some conditions in the Gallery album, but it should give an idea of the original formatting (that and the main body of the text is pretty legible, as far as I'm concerned at the moment).
This is also going through the Project Gutenberg e-book processes, so please don't leech the files for this book for that reason either. Thanks!
Read the book using its Gallery album to view it. A zipped file will be made available sometime in the next six months. I'm aware that some pages may be a bit hard to read, but one should at least be able to see the intended formatting, and clickable enlargements are available as usual.
This book is also being sent through PG, so the usual request applies.
Read the book using its Gallery album to view it.
This book is also being sent through PG, so the usual request applies.
Read the book using its Gallery album to view it. A zipped file with the original scans will be made available in the next twelve months.
If you don't need scanned images, try the Project Gutenberg edition instead.
This is also going through the Project Gutenberg e-book processes, so please don't leech the files for this book for that reason. Thanks.
Disclaimer: This judgment is published here as part of the proof of concept for this page. I do not necessarily endorse, approve of or otherwise make comment on it or the Royal Commission it discusses.
I should also add that the only reason the Royal Commission isn't here is because of the page size in relation to the scanners I currently utilise.
Read this book of only four pages using its Gallery album to view it. I won't bother with a zipped file, as it's only four pages!
Scanned because it was in the AJHR after Mental Defectives and Sexual Offenders -- not even Parliament in 1925 could escape a supposed moral decline during recess!
I'm sending this to PG due to the historical (if only minor and humorous) value it has.
This book contains a the now New Zealand Parliamentary Library's centennial history.
Going through Project Gutenberg. Please don't leech for that.
Read this book as either as a PDF file, or as a Project Gutenberg e-book.
Nothing special. Just an annual report of one of the predecessor organisations of the National Library of New Zealand. Scanned because it shared the H-32 AJHR code with the 1958 annual report of the General Assembly Library.
Been through Project Gutenberg, so please don't leech for putting through them.
Occasionally, I come across the odd document related to some of those listed above that are not covered by Section 27(1), but are public domain anyway in both the US and NZ.
I have put these non-S27(1) (and PD-only) documents because of their significance in relation to the S27(1) documents listed in the previous section of this page.
I can't say it enough times, but if you are squeamish about sexual health issues, some discretion is advised while reading the titles listed on this page. That said, one of the books listed below (Ettie Rout's Safe Marriage, 1922) was a bestseller in England and did much for promoting women's health issues, so I can't imagine too many issues with one reading it.
Currently, the only other documents listed here are Ettie Rout's Safe Marriage (1922), and William Allan Chapple's The Fertility of the Unfit (1903).
Read the book using its Gallery album to view it. Courtesy of the PG DP project, you may find reading the book using their split pages (also stored in the same Gallery album) of my scan much easier.
If you don't need scanned images, use the Project Gutenberg edition instead.
A zipped file of the scans may be made available in the next six months.
Like pretty much everything else listed on this page, this book is also going through the PG e-book processes, so please don't leech the files for that.
If you have subscriber access to the ODNB, you may find Jane Tolerton's entry on Ettie Rout a short but useful read for understanding the context in which this book (Safe Marriage, that is) was written. The DNZB has published a similar Jane Tolerton entry, which is available free.
Read the book using its Gallery album to view it.
A zipped file of the scans may be made available in the next six months.
Like pretty much everything else listed on this page, this book is also going through the PG e-book processes, so please don't leech the files for that.
Read and or download the book as a PDF file. I haven't provided a Gallery album this time, to trial how PDF files appeal to everyone.
Like pretty much everything else listed on this page, this book is also going through the PG e-book processes, so please don't leech the file for that.
From what I can tell, this book's author, Rev JLA Kayll, was according to Auckland City Libraries the mayor of the Mount Eden Borough (a forerunner of the post-1989 Auckland City) for three months in 1923.
The book that this book responds to is the 1903 tome that I've also scanned, that is, The Fertility of the Unfit. He published this response in 1905 while (according to Rev Michael Blain's Biographical Directory of Anglican Clergy) he was the vicar at Pokeno, Auckland. Most relevantly, however, the dictionary notes that he was a leading figure in New Zealand penal reform, founder of Waikeria reformatory,
and after a spell as a prison chaplain, studied criminology. This interest in prison reform is noted in the title page of this book.
Read the book using its Gallery album to view it.
A zipped file of the scans may be made available in the next six months.
The scanned images were donated by a kind CP on PG's DP site.
Note: the above book is not New Zealand-related, but is included here anyway to give historical context.
Read and or download the book as a PDF file. I haven't provided a Gallery album this time, to trial how PDF files appeal to everyone.
This book is available in both a Project Gutenberg edition, plus a more 'unofficial' version of that. The latter incorporates some of the recent orthographic changes in the Māori language since this book's publication.
There is a Dictionary of New Zealand Biography entry on the author. Rev HJ Fletcher is listed as a Presbyterian minister, who according to the dictionary served Māori in the North Island.
The Hinemoa tale is told in unmacronised Māori on pages 5 to 11. The rest of the 28-page book was written in English -- that includes the cover, title page, introduction, a genealogy, notes and commentary, and a vocabulary.
And... in addition to all of the above books, you may also find others in the S27(1)/PD Gallery that I haven't had the time to document yet. But they've been uploaded anyway.
Most of these said books are not NZ-related, but have had scans uploaded anyway to give historical context to those listed. Just don't ask why The Tale of Peter Rabbit or a recipe book from 1685 got added.
Of course the question would be: why the heck would you do this?
Well, there's a lot of cool (yet, admittedly, boring to death) stuff out there in the AJHR. To be exact, primary source documents. The stuff that's cool to cite in essays, but hard to get a copy. For example, the lending copy of the Mazengarb Report (1954) in the VUW Law Library is a photocopy!
Seriously, though, unless you knew where in the masses of the AJHR where to find it, you wouldn't have a particularly good chance of finding it overseas. Domestically, even -- even though I'm told it was one of the biggest jobs for the Government Printer at the time.
There's also a lack of access to some less recent stuff, such as inquiries.
Beyond 'because I can, because the law says so', there are two other reasons, based on recent a recent Act you should be able to get online in its entirety:
The stuff is all over the place on the Internet. For example, with recent legislation such as the Civil Union Act 2004, you can find the Act itself on a PCO website, or on a public website of a company that contracts to them, and the Bill and SOPs on the latter's.
Then, if you want the select committee reports, you got to go to the Clerk of the House's website.
Some of the sites have questionable copyright in terms of Section 27. For example, the PCO website is currently supplied by Brookers, which being 'adulterated' by Brookers, means some copyright exists.
In short, I'm also hoping to bring together stuff of interest to myself in one place, with the assurance at least in my mind they're covered by Section 27.
Some of these resources (at least the 1954 Mazengarb Report, anyway) may also be useful if you're taking EDUC 229 (Making Meaning: Young People, Society and School) at the VUW FOE's School of Education Studies. It's also useful for some GEND papers (and some other EDUC papers) from the SES too, I hear.
I'm told some of these resources may be useful in some History or Education papers.
I imagine they'll of course be useful in a million other things.
If you know me, you know I get scared at the sight of a solicitor or barrister looking for me.
First, and foremost, I scanned these documents or converted them into the formats they're provided in for my own study and morbid amusement -- paramount has been the academic interest in researching the topics. The only reason (other than those already listed) is because I've been asked to provide the scans seeing I'd gone to the trouble of doing so.
While, of course, all reasonable efforts are made at ensuring that the scanned documents are accurate, you use the documents at your own risk. For example, if you find you fail (or pass) an assignment at school, lose (or win) a court case because of these copies, my hands are clean. If you or your computer dies as a result, I don't want to know either.
The operative word is this: if you need absolute certainty, go and use the original source documents I did. In terms of Acts of Parliament and probably bylaws, the printed copies are still the definitive babies in court, not some electronic database, be it this page, or Brookers!
Even shorter: as is, where is. Use at your own risk. And, IANAL!
I can't really say it any more clearly.
Second, if you really think copyright has been infringed, please send e-mail. Address below in the page footer. However, I can now add that I've obtained more than enough informal legal advice in NZ from librarians, similar people familiar with Section 27, people familiar with the public domain concept, a university's copyright officer and at least one lawyer, that all insist that the documents I intend to consider for this page are effectively public domain in their country of origin, so I'm fairly certain. But, of course, I'm willing to listen.
I've decided to move any new items about page updates to the new location of my diary, the power house, seeing I was going to change focus of the diary towards e-book issues. I've also created a Section 27(1) category page and an associated Atom feed to go with it, to make it easier to catch up on things.
The Report of the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents is now listed as In Post-Processing
on DP.
I'm also looking for suggestions on stuff to digitise next, so please feel free to e-mail them in to me. Address below at the bottom of the page.
The Report of the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents is now making its way through DP.
In the meantime, I've made the scans available in a Gallery album (see above) while I double confirm the copyright issues.
I've received Project Gutenberg copyright clearance for the document, so I'm likely to be getting it through DP's OCR processes shortly. I'm still waiting for enough clearances to post the scans here, however.
Subject to copyright clearances being sorted to keep pesky solicitors at bay, I expect to have a scanned copy of the Mazengarb Report, otherwise known as the Report of the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents published here in January to February 2005. In any case, it's otherwise ready for uploading.
Thanks to the libraries and individuals that have either supplied me the source documents to scan, or electronic versions straight from the publisher concerned. For privacy reasons, if I haven't listed you here, feel free to e-mail me if you'd like to change this.
A word of thanks is also due to the DP people, who have been helping me turn the Report of the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents into e-book format for PG. (Have a moment? Go to the DP site, read the proofreading guidelines and proofread a page today.)
You might also find my other (some of it less serious) ibiblio-hosted work interesting. I also have some older work hosted elsewhere.
