In addition to having custody of official records, State Records has the responsibility of ensuring that members of the public can access and use them. These access requirements are spelt in the Act and read as follows:
Objects of the Act
5. (1) The objects of this Act are -
Public access to records in the custody of State Records
26. (3) Applications for public access to official records in the custody of State Records must be made to the Manager in the manner and form and be accompanied by the fee (if any) prescribed by regulation.
Such access is quite simple when dealing with traditional paper format records. The principles behind managing access to electronic records are no different - i.e. the relevant records need to be found, the records must remain secure and unchanged during use by enquirers, and personal privacy and other sensitivities relating to government policy and interaction with the private sector must be protected. However, the nature of electronic records makes managing access to them more complex. And, increasingly, the traditional separation of the processes of looking for information about records, and of examining a group of selected records, will diminish.
One of State Records’ central responsibilities, as spelt out in section 7(d) of the Act, is to publish guides and finding aids to records in our custody or whose delivery has been postponed or are subject to an exemption from transfer granted by the Manager. In the world of electronic records State Records would need to be able to assure itself that we have an accurate picture of all the electronic records in use in the public sector and that we could adequately describe these records without breaching security and privacy issues. This is what is generally termed intellectual control. For electronic records, the description will need to include information about what the records contain as well as metadata.
However, there look to be other ways in which this obligation will be able to be discharged well. One is through the development of a Locator Service, as seems likely in the Commonwealth. A second may lie in the capability of the Online services delivered by the Government, particularly if these are more closely associated with facilitating access under the Freedom of Information Act.
Where State Records has custody of electronic records, it will be imperative to determine exactly how the records are to be stored (i.e. what format) as this will have a direct impact on their use by members of the public. Since we have decided against the software/hardware museum model, how will we be able to ensure that enquirers have confidence that the information which they are using is an accurate reflection of the state in which the records were generated and received? This question also arises if State Records mandates a transfer standard for all electronic records destined to be transferred into our custody. Any standardised format may - directly or indirectly - alter the structure, content and context of the records. In such a situation the issue of whether State Records is adequately meeting its responsibilities as a guardian for the future of the integrity of the evidence contained in records of the present must be addressed.
If State Records adopts a non-custodial role, then the question of public use and access to the records held by agencies must be considered. Currently agencies in the public sector are not affected greatly by members of the public who wish to view older records, since these people come to State Records and view the records in the reading room. In a distributed custody model, there would be a significant impact on agencies in terms of them needing to address the public user requests, to ensure that space is provided, to supervise the users and to provide adequate guides and controls on access to the records. Even where access is provided online, much of this requirement remains.
One option is that State Records acts as a central guide to all electronic records in the public sector and simply direct users to the correct system in any agency. If State Records is to do this, we shall need to be confident that we have completely accurate data on all of the electronic records in use, or being created by every agency in the public sector. Such an exercise will require State Records vigorously to interrogate and record the systems and records in use. This will require an extensive allocation of time and resources.
The issue of metadata is one that needs consideration in both of the above models. Such data would need to be accurate and complete and useable by public users otherwise they could not have confidence in the information which they are using. However, experience elsewhere suggests that the acquisition and description of such data is a very complex exercise, and is not of much help to public users.
This model was favoured by the Parliamentary Inquiry into the Public Record Office of Victoria.. While it relieves agencies of the responsibilities of managing public access themselves, it still raises some serious technological and security issues. It may be costly for State Records to be able to ensure that its electronic search systems would be compatible with every system in use in the public sector. There would need to be care taken to ensure that members of the public could not access personally sensitive information to which they were not entitled. And, obviously, there would need to security issues addressed, but these might be simpler than each agency having a direct interface with the public.
Issues for consideration
1. If State Records were to be
a custodian of electronic records how would it ensure that the records were
accessible to the public given the widely differing formats of records currently
being created?
2. In a non-custodial model how would State Records minimise the impact on
agencies when handling public access requests?
3. How would State Records satisfy agencies that public users would not be
a threat to other systems not directly available to users?
4. How would State Records ensure that privacy and confidentiality concerns
were met in custodial or non-custodial access models?
5. How would State Records ensure that it could maintain an effective link
in central gateway model? How would security and resourcing issues be addressed?
6. How would State Records ensure that it had sufficient intellectual control
over electronic records in a non-custodial model?
Electronic records are a critical element in the conduct of the business of the Government of South Australia, its accountability and the ongoing documentary heritage of the State. But this depends on steps are taken now to ensure that electronic records are properly created and do survive. And these steps will need to be taken in the context of a longer-term strategy embracing all the Government’s information.
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