Guides and databases: Law: Welcome

Welcome to the Law subject guide

This guide has been compiled by your specialist Subject Liaison Librarian and provides guidance relating to resources in the subject area of Law.

Use the menu to see what's available, including print and online materials, how-to videos, and details of further training available through LibrarySkills@UCL.

You may also find the following subject guides useful:

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to get in touch.

Subject collections

The Law collection is housed in the Donaldson Reading Room on the 1st floor of the Main Library, and contains books on the law and legal history of England & Wales, as well as foreign, comparative, and international law.

As well as books, the collection includes law reports and legislation from a number of common law jurisdictions, including Australia, Canada and New Zealand.

Our print collections are complemented by an extensive range of online resources. The key resources in this subject area are:

Lexis+ UK
Formerly known as LexisLibrary, Lexis+ UK provides access to key primary materials such as The Law Reports, The English Reports, and consolidated versions of all UK legislation in force, as well as resources not available elsewhere such as the All England Law Reports, New Law Journal, and Halsbury's Laws of England.
Westlaw UK
Provides access to a similar range of primary materials as Lexis+ UK. Content exclusive to this database includes the Common Market Law Reports, Criminal Appeal Reports and European Human Rights Reports, as well as major academic journals such as the Law Quarterly Review. Users will need to register with their name and UCL email address the first time they login.
vLex Justis
As well as the full text of all UK Acts as enacted from 1235 to the present day, vLex Justis also contains the largest collection of transcripts of UK court judgments available online, some of which date as far back as 1852. However, perhaps the most useful aspect of the database, especially for new law students, is the integrated legal index and citator, which provides links to the full text of case reports and consolidated versions of legislation in other databases, including Lexis+ UK and Westlaw UK.
Law Trove
Provides online access to approximately 200 legal textbooks published by Oxford University Press.

There are also some extremely useful resources freely available on the web. The most important of these are:

British and Irish Legal Information Institute (BAILII)
BAILII provides access to the most comprehensive set of British and Irish legal materials freely available on the Internet, and is a particularly useful source of transcripts of judgments in unreported cases.
Cardiff Index to Legal Abbreviations
Enables you to search for the meaning of abbreviations for English language legal publications from the British Isles, the Commonwealth, and the United States, including those covering international and comparative law.
Oxford University Standard for the Citation of Legal Authorities (OSCOLA)
OSCOLA is designed to facilitate the accurate citation of authorities, legislation, and other legal materials and is widely used in law schools (including UCL) and by journal and book publishers.

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