Parallel processing is a key topic which is becoming more important as the technology becomes more widespread. UK Parallel '96 - Proceedings of the BCS PPSG Annual Group is the publication of the academic programme from the first in an annual series of national conferences covering the broad area of parallel and distributed computing. It was coordinated by the BCS Parallel Processing Specialist Group and provided a focus for both research and industrial presentations. This first conference was held at the University of Surrey in July 1996, and contains work from a number of universities within the UK. The scope of the proceedings illustrates the breadth of the work being undertaken in the UK and includes a variety of papers covering a number of important areas, including: compiler development for both data-parallel and message passing languages and the development of application specific software.