Introduction
Cross references can be created to other amendments inside Explanatory Statements. The system will create a link to the target amendment so that when it is assigned a number, the cross reference e.g. the system Lawmaker will detect these changes and update the displayed number following an ‘update’ operation.
How to create a cross references to an amendment
Manually paste cross references
To manually create a cross-reference to another amendment in an explanatory statement, browse to the target amendment you want to cross refer to using the Structure View
Right-click on the amendment and hover the mouse cursor over the ‘select x-ref to copy’ menu, selecting the amendment cross reference text from the second context menu presented by the system
Return to the Editor view and click with your mouse cursor in the place in your explanatory statement that you would like the cross reference to be inserted
Use the ‘paste’ keyboard shortcut Ctrl + V to insert your cross reference into your specified location. Manually created cross references will always appear in orange text when they are first inserted, to indicate they are valid.
How to update cross references
Manually triggering an ‘update x-ref’ action
Either:
Highlight some text or the whole explanatory statement (by selecting it in the structure view or selecting 'explanatory statement' from the breadcrumb); or
Leave your cursor in the amendment list
Specify you would like to check for existing cross references by
Clicking on the ‘update x-ref’ button in the upper tool bar
From the upper tool bar, select Tools > Update x-refs
Right-click in Structure view or Editor view and select Update x-refs, or
Use the keyboard short cut Alt + u
If you didn’t highlight a provision, the system will check whether you want to update the current provision that your cursor is in, or whether you want to update the whole quoted structure/amendment list (depending on cursor placement).
Specify your preferred range
The system will attempt to acquire a lock on the appropriate document fragment if it hasn’t got one already and will then update any existing cross references and present any that it finds according to the table below.
How to remove (unwrap) tagged cross references
Place mouse cursor in the marked-up cross-reference
Right-click and select ‘Remove x-ref tag’, or
From the upper toolbar, select ‘Remove x-ref tag’
The system will remove the cross-reference mark up and leave behind the text
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Hints and tips
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Cross references are presented in the following styles according to their status:
Style | Status | Description |
Orange text | Valid | The system has identified the text to be a cross reference and has created a mapping to the corresponding target provision |
Grey highlighted text | Invalid | The system has identified the text to be a cross reference but has been unable to find the corresponding target provision in the document. Users can choose to ignore the invalid cross reference if they knew the target provision hadn’t been written yet. Or, you can update the cross reference’s status to ‘ignore’ which means the system will no longer attempt to update the cross reference following an ‘update x-ref’ operation. (in future, pattern matching will be continually refined to minimise this occurrence) |
| Info |
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Hints and Tips The House of Lords and the House of Commons have agreed for amendment cross references to be inserted as capital "Amendment X" The system will present the unique number if the amendment hasn't been assigned a number yet e.g. HoC1. When the amendment has been assigned a number, running 'Update x-ref' will resolve the cross reference so that it uses the number instead of the unique number. Don’t use ‘Paste’ from the right-click menus or upper toolbar as this uses a specific “paste special’ method that hasn’t been properly configured to work in our version of the application yet. |