For the Record - December 2024

Recordkeeping

Standards and Code of Best Practice

The State Records NSW Board recently approved a revised Standard on the physical storage of State records, a revised Standard on records management, and the renewal of AS/ISO 15489.1:2017 as the Code of Best Practice.

In early 2025 we will revoke the current Standard on the physical storage of State records (Standard No. 13) and the Standard on records management (Standard No. 12) and issue the new standards. At the same time, we will also formally renew the Code of Best Practice. We will write to all public offices to advise of the issue of the new standards and code and the availability of updated implementation guides for the standards.

We are also working on revising the Records Management Assessment Tool (RMAT) to incorporate the revised requirements in the standards. We anticipate having a revised RMAT available for use by April 2025.

We will be taking a pause in monitoring exercises during 2025 to plan the rollout of future monitoring exercises. The next Recordkeeping Monitoring Exercise will be in 2026.

If you have any queries about the revised standards, or the revisions to the RMAT, please contact us at govrec@staterecords.nsw.gov.au .

Retention and disposal authorities

The State Records NSW Board recently approved the following:

• A revised disposal authority for local government records
• A revised disposal authority for Regional Development & Support including the Office of the Cross-Border Commissioner
• A revised records retention and disposal authority for the Land and Environment Court
• Revoking of FA281 for the Board of Vocational Education and Training
• Reissue of FA264 for the Office of Transport Safety Investigations.

The revised disposal authorities will be issued and made available on our website in early 2025. Senior responsible officers and records and information management contacts at impacted public offices will also be notified when the authorities are issued.

Existing retention and disposal authorities may be used until revised authorities are issued, when the previous authorities will be formally superseded.

Annual Report published

The State Records Authority NSW 2023–24 Annual Report has been published. You can read the report on our new website.

Highlights for the 2023–24 financial year were:

• Reviewed existing online eLearning materials and refreshed eight eLearning modules to support recordkeeping in public offices.
• Completed review and Board approval of 13 retention and disposal authorities to ensure that disposal rules were relevant, current and fit for purpose.
• Increased comprehensive records retention and disposal coverage of 376 public offices to 98%.
• Conducted the annual Recordkeeping Monitoring Exercise with an increased public office participation rate of 77% (up from 74% in 2023) and further improvement towards achieving baseline compliance with recordkeeping requirements under the State Records Act 1998 (the overall recordkeeping maturity score across the jurisdiction was 2.93 out of 5, up from 2.79 in 2023).
• Completed the first comprehensive review of the Building the Archives Policy since its publication in 2001. The policy guides State Records NSW in performing its statutory role of identifying records that should be retained as State archives.

Recording of November Records Managers Forum available

The recording of the 7 November Records Managers Forum is now available on our website.

The Forum features guest speaker Rachel McCallum, then NSW Information Commissioner and now NSW Electoral Commissioner.

Rachel spoke on the work of the IPC NSW and its relationship to recordkeeping and the work of State Records NSW.

The Chief Executive Officer of Museums of History NSW, Annette Pitman also introduced herself to the public office records and information managers at the Forum.

OneCX update

We are continuing with our staged transition to the nsw.gov.au platform.

Revised recordkeeping guidance content about Creating and capturing records and Planning for strategic records management is now live on the new website.

The updated content is designed to provide improved accessibility, usability and structure.

To ensure a seamless experience, redirects will be put into place to ensure that any bookmarks you may have will lead you to the correct information.

With consolidation taking place, the content may look different and be combined on a page with other relevant information. If you are unsure of where to find information you need, or find yourself in an unfamiliar location, the new and powerful search feature will help find the information the information you are looking for.

The website transition is planned to finish in early 2025.

We’ll advise closer to the date, when the site launch is due to occur. In the meantime, please bookmark any pages on the new website that you frequently refer to.

eLearning update

On Monday, 9 December we held an information session for all public offices who had contacted us about embedding SCORM files of our revised eLearning modules into their own learning management system (LMS).

A demonstration session on downloading SCORM files from the State Records NSW Learning Portal for public offices involved in testing can be viewed on YouTube.

State Records NSW will follow up with public offices who embed the modules in the new year to discuss their experience implementing the modules.

Are you prepared for a potential disaster this summer?

As summer approaches, it’s time to prepare for natural disasters such as wet weather events and bushfires. These events can affect records and recordkeeping systems.

Make sure your organisation’s disaster reaction and recovery plan for records is up to date and ready for use. See our website and the Australian Institute for the Conservation of Cultural Material website for information on disaster reaction and recovery plans and preparing for disasters.

If your organisation needs information and contacts in the event of a disaster, please see the disaster recovery resources on our website.  If you require assistance with records affected by a disaster, please contact govrec@staterecords.nsw.gov.au .

Christmas/New Year closure

State Records NSW will be closed from Monday 23 December 2024 and reopen on Monday 6 January 2025. Please email enquiries to govrec@staterecords.nsw.gov.au and we will reply on, or soon after, 6 January.

Best wishes for the holiday season

We would like to wish you a safe and happy holiday season and thank you all for your efforts to support good recordkeeping over the course of the year. We look forward to working with you again in 2025.

Museums of History NSW updates

Reminder - Transfer Plan must be submitted by 31 December 2024

By the end of 2024, public offices are required to have submitted a transfer plan to Museums of History NSW (MHNSW) under Part 4 s.32 (4) of the State Records Act 1998. Agencies are being asked to provide information about long-term arrangements for the State records under their control.

Only records required as State archives under a retention and disposal authority need to be included.

Advice relating to the new requirement is now available on the MHNSW website under transfer plans.  The Records Managers Forum held on 24 May 2024 focused on Transfer Plans and can be accessed here: Records Managers Online Forum - 24 May 2024. 

Public offices have until 31 December 2024 to submit their plans via the online Service Portal: Service Portal login. 

With the Christmas Closedown period 2024–2025 commencing on 23 December 2024, any public offices who have not yet submitted a transfer plan only have until Friday 20 December to act.

If you have questions regarding the Transfer Plan, such as what level of detail to include, or how to report holding size and record format, please don’t hesitate to contact the Agency Services team via transfer@mhnsw.au .