Tag Archive for "Archives"

Archives Educates the DIA

Back in August I posted about how the Department of Internal Affairs had been deleting the reports used to justify filtering sites in the trial. This seemed a bit suspect to me, especially as they knew I had a request with the Ombudsman appealing their refusal to give me copies of them under the Official Information Act.

It’s also in contravention of the Public Records Act so I sent a letter asking the Chief Archivist what could be done about it. You can download the PDF of their reply, but the gist of it is in the following quote:

The Department of Internal Affairs report that they have taken steps to address this problem. The Department of Internal Affairs have made their staff familiar with the mandatory standards issued by the Chief Archivist that are relevant to managing these records in accordance with the Public Records Act 2005. Steps have also been taken to ensure that website filtering records cannot be deleted without seeking the necessary authority to do so.

I consider that these are appropriate remedial steps that will result in ongoing compliance with the Act.

I’m sure we can all be pleased that the Censorship Unit at the DIA will now do a better job of maintaining their data.