This memoir discusses on the use of translation and interpreting to reproduce and archive multilingual meetings. The discussion centers on the democratic principle of parliamentary transparency and the ability of translation and/or interpreting to fulfill it in the case of verbatim recordings and audiovisual broadcasts/recordings. The approach takes in the history of verbatim recording, the principal theories of translation studies and interpreting studies and the variables introduced by technology and changing attitudes. KEYWORDS: verbatim reports, parliamentary debates, rules of procedure, democratic transparency, linguistic disenfranchisement, translation, interpretation, multilingual organizations