Libraries have always been, and still are, repositories of knowledge and information. Their purpose is to store information for long periods and make it accessible for use. I believe the mission of librarians is to ensure that this knowledge and information is freely available for use throughout Japan. The National Diet Library, of which I am Librarian, has two sites: one in Tokyo, the other in Kansai Science City. This is fi ne for people who are able to visit the Library in person when they wish to use its collection, but we should strive to be able to provide the same level of service to the many people who cannot visit the Library in person as we do to those who can. To this end, we need to build a proper digital library. I should therefore like to give you a brief outline of the present status of digitization at the National Diet Library. First, we have the Minutes of the Diet. The records of the plenary sessions and also of each committee have all been digitized and, if you go to the National Diet Library website, you will see that they can all be searched. This makes it possible to check, in detail, who asked or answered what questions on a particular

committee, and when.