Disclaimer
This website is presented by Parliament to provide information free of charge for the benefit of the public. Parliament monitors the quality of the information available on this website and updates the information regularly.
Parliament does not guarantee, and accepts no legal liability whatsoever arising from or connected to, the accuracy, reliability, currency or completeness of any material contained on this website or on any linked site.
Parliament recommends that users exercise their own skill and care with respect to their use of this website and that users carefully evaluate the accuracy, currency, completeness and relevance of the material on the website for their purposes.
The material on this site may include views or recommendations of third parties, which do not necessarily reflect the views of the Commonwealth, or indicate its commitment to a particular course of action.
This website contains links to other websites that are external to Parliament. Parliament takes reasonable care in linking websites but has no direct control over the content of the linked sites, or the changes that may occur to the content on those sites. It is the responsibility of the user to make their own decisions about the accuracy, currency, reliability and correctness of information contained in linked external websites. Links to other websites are inserted for convenience and do not constitute endorsement of material at those sites, or any associated organisation, product or service.
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Privacy
Scope
This statement applies to all users who access the Parliament of Australia Web Site.
General
The Parliament of Australia Web Site makes some use of data that only indirectly identifies users. We take great care with practices that affect personal privacy. As a general rule, we do not collect or record data that directly identifies users.
Data Collection
Data that indirectly identifies users is gathered during interactions with the Parliament of Australia Web Site in the following circumstances:
- Computer Information
It is necessary that your web browser provides your machine's network address, so the web server can address its replies back to the correct machine. In addition, the browser type and operating system information may be recorded.
- Navigation and Click-Stream Data
Browsing any web site generates a trail of pages visited, the amount of data transferred and the time of access. This information is recorded against the network address supplied by your web browser.
- Electronic Mail
It is a necessary part of electronic mail that a sender and receiver address is supplied. These are recorded as well as a message identifier, amount of data and the time. The address you supply as sender is only a pseudonym and may possibly bear no relation to your real name, so is not considered as directly identifying you.
Forms
If you use forms on the site to provide information, register interest, or purchase publications, the information you provide is not retained on the public web server and will not be used for purposes other than that for which it was provided.
We will only record your e-mail address if you send us a message. It will only be used for the purpose for which it was provided and will not be added to a mailing list unless that is the purpose of the message. We will not use your e-mail address for any other purpose, and will not disclose it without your consent.
Data Storage, Retention, Use and Disclosure
The data referred to above is generated by the systems you are accessing, and stored in system logs. These logs are preserved and archived for possible future use.
The data is used by Parliament of Australia Web Site software, and by our support staff, only for
- web site and systems administration, including monitoring as a security measure
- customisation of the web site to meet your needs
- evaluation, research and development.
The data collected will not be disclosed to a third party except where it is legally required, such as in the investigation of a criminal offence, and in compliance with a search warrant or subpoena.
Cookies
A cookie is a very small text file placed onto your computer when you visit a Web site. A cookie can be 'persistent' (meaning that it is written to a permanent file on your hard disk) or 'session-only' (in which case the cookie is deleted at the end of your browsing session).
Cookies are not generally used on the Parliament's site. The exception to this is the search facility, which has been built to use only temporary 'session ID' cookies. One cookie is created at the beginning of the user's search session and discarded at its conclusion. The cookie is not used to collect or store any information about the user, only to allocate a temporary identifier to the search session.
Without such a session ID, the user would lose the entire search context each time a new web page is visited during a search session e.g. by viewing a document retrieved by a search. If cookies are disabled, the search program could not provide more than a very basic functionality - far less than is expected by our users.
Our live broadcasts do not use cookies.
User Feedback
We seek feedback from our users in order to improve the service offered by the site. Answering feedback questions is voluntary and does not in any way affect your access to the Parliament website.
Parliament records the information requested on the online forms in a database. The information will only be used for the purpose for which it was requested and will not be distributed further, or disclosed, without your consent.
Note
Our agency recognises that there can be risks associated with the transmission of information over the internet.
Links to other sites
This site contains links to other sites. The Parliament is not responsible for the privacy practice or the content of such web sites.