National Bodies Working Group

The National Bodies Working Group was established in 2010 to deal with the creation of the Australian Health Practitioners Regulation Agency (AHPRA), a national body required to operate in accordance with legislation from eight different states and territories. The role of the Working Group was later broadened to focus on all national government bodies established to operate across different jurisdictions. CAARA Policy 11 Guidelines for the Treatment of Records of Inter-Governmental Agencies guides the work of the Group.

National Bodies are established under national schemes where Constitutional powers rest with States and Territories, and not the Commonwealth, and where the bodies concerned are not otherwise Commonwealth bodies. The Working Group maintains a register of national bodies and their respective legislative recordkeeping obligations to clarify which recordkeeping act applies.

Since its creation the Group has liaised with AHPRA in relation to its obligations under the various recordkeeping acts. Gaining CAARA endorsement of an archival host arrangement so that AHPRA may function with one regulatory framework for the management and disposal of records has been a key achievement of the Group. This arrangement enables a cost-effective nationwide approach to recordkeeping (including digitisation, storage and disposal) realises the Council of Australian Government (COAG) intention of national consistency and provides a template for managing records of current and future intergovernmental agencies. Under this arrangement Public Record Office Victoria is the archival host for AHPRA and its national boards.

The Working Group continues to work through the practicalities of records transfer and provision of access across the jurisdictions and plans to establish agreed processes and protocols in time.

Work achieved since 2010:

The Working Group is chaired by Public Record Office Victoria and meets via teleconference as required.

The current membership comprises:

Northern Territory  Linda Bell
Tasmania  Allegra Huxtable
Victoria  Julie McCormack (Chair)
Queensland  Elizabeth Hawkins

Australian Capital Territory  Kristy Tiberi
New South Wales  Kristy Tiberi
South Australia  Kirsty Buchan
Western Australia Dean Britton

Terms of Reference are available here »