Council of Australasian
Archives and Records Authorities  

Disposition of Records following Administrative Change

Adopted: 27 July 1999

COFSTA recommends that members adhere to carefully considered practices in the management of records following the transfer of functions between governments.

Rationale

Intergovernmental agreements may result in the transfer of responsibility for administering or managing functions between member States, Territories and the Commonwealth.

Agencies that anticipate either abolition or restructure as a result of such agreements must ensure that the agreement will uphold the integrity of their records. Ownership, custodial and access arrangements should also be built into the intergovernment agreement.

Definitions

Relinquishing Agency/Government: entity previously responsible for creating and maintaining records pertaining to a function. It may be a continuing or defunct entity following the transfer.

Receptor Agency/Government: entity now responsible for administering or managing the above.

Primary record: the original record from which other versions have been generated, for example microfilm.

Guidelines

Ownership

In any transfer of functions between governments, the records of the relinquishing agency remain the property of that agency and/or its relinquishing government unless there is a contract or legal agreement which takes into account the statutory requirements of the governments concerned.

The agency nominated by the receptor government to administer the function or facility should implement a recordkeeping system that reflects its new responsibilities. All records maintained under this new system are the property of the receptor government.

Records Management Practices

All non current records created by the relinquishing agency should be closed.

All current records that document finalised business should be closed at or before the date the function is transferred.

All current records that document current business activity (for which the relinquishing agency bears responsibility) should be closed when that activity has been finalised.

Records from the previous system that reflect current transactions (that is, active" records at the date of transfer of responsibility for the function) should be captured by the receptor agency’s records management system. "Capture" in this sense may entail the recording of data about the records (for example, metadata) and/or copying the records on to microfilm or some other format.

The capture of these documents may require that they (the originals) be lent to the receptor agency’s custody for a finite period. In such instances electronic records should be closed and access restricted to "read only". Similarly, paper-based records should not be renumbered, altered or rearranged in any way by the receptor agency.

The final disposition of those records that the receptor agency has captured (that is, copies) must be negotiated between that agency and its archival authority. (If no copies have been made, both parties have an interest in the disposition of the primary records until the matter has been resolved.)

Access and Retrieval

Irrespective of what happens to the relinquishing agency, it should be possible at all times to identify, locate and access information contained in its records. This applies to both paper-based and electronic records.

An archival authority that has custody of a defunct agency’s records should provide the receptor agency with access to any documents the latter requires for the conduct of its business. The relevant Intergovernment agreement should include this principle.

The relinquishing agency should notify the receptor agency whether any records likely to include documents that pertain to its new functions have already been transferred to archival custody.

Access to the primary records will be determined by the relevant legislation of the relinquishing government, while access to the captured/copied documents will be determined by equivalent legislation in the receptor government. Consultation between both governments will be necessary to avoid differences in access and any potential embarrassment which that might cause.

Where any relinquishing government looks to have specified rights of access into the records created by the receptor government, this is a decision for the receptor government.

Disposal

Before abolition is finalised, disposal of those closed records that were previously maintained by the relinquishing agency should be carried out by that agency

a) in accordance with existing formal disposal arrangements; and

b) in collaboration with the archives authority that approved those arrangements.

The archives authority may need to directly implement existing formal disposal arrangements and co-ordinate the disposal of unsentenced records in cases where the relinquishing agency cannot complete the work.

The archives authority should always consult the receptor agency before closed records that pertain to that agency’s current operations are finally disposed of. This consultative process does not negate the principle that records which are closed when functions and facilities are transferred between governments should remain the property of the continuing relinquishing agency (and/or government) that created and maintained them.

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Contact the Executive Officer of CAARA on 03 9348 5673 or diane.brodie@prov.vic.gov.au

Last modified: July 22, 2008