Parliamentary launch of the Campaign - 18 January 2023
Parliamentary launch of the Campaign for Records – Democracy and Rights in the Digital Age
At an event at Portcullis House, Westminster, on 18th January 2023 the Archives and Records Association and the Information and Records Management Society launched the Campaign for Records – Democracy and Rights in the Digital Age. The event was hosted by Chris Evans MP, chair of the APPG Archives and History
About the Campaign for Records
The Campaign for Records highlights the need for better records management in public life and calls for more resources, modern law, better regulation and improved freedom of information and access to public records.
Without a robust framework for the collection and preservation of records, the age of dis and mis-information will continue. Accusations of ‘fake-news’, conspiracies and cover-ups will abound and trust in government and democracy will be further undermined.
Fundamentally there needs to be proper investment into the recordkeeping sector and its work. The campaign will also consider the need for a new, comprehensive legislative framework to ensure that digital records across the public sector (and its partners and contractors) will provide the essential records and evidence that the public need to rebuild and maintain trust in government and diminish the threat to representative democracy.
About the Event on 18th January
Speakers at the event reiterated many of these themes. Attendees, who included campaign stakeholders and contributors as well as members of IRMS and ARA heard from Ruth Macleod, Vice Chair of ARA, Reynold Leming, Chair of IRMS, Chris Evans MP, MP for Islwyn, Shadow Minister for Defence Procurement, Chair APPG Archives and History, Richard Ovenden, Bodley's Librarian in the University of Oxford, Jon Baines, Senior Data Protection Specialist at Mishcon de Reya LLP and Lord Parkinson of Whitely Bay, Minister for Arts and Heritage.
Introducing ARA and IRMS
Ruth Macleod, Vice Chair of the Archives and Records Association introduced the event and spoke of the need to restore trust in democracy, saying:
“The way to do this is through improved recordkeeping leading to quick responses to freedom of information requests and the ability to provide relevant evidence to public inquiries. There can be no accountability unless some form of account is kept. It may seem oxymoronic that history also has a future, but the future of our history is under threat. Unless we safeguard the records that we keep and continue to archive them and ensure that those archives are fully representative of who we are and what we did, our future history will be fatally flawed.”
Then followed an entertaining introduction from Reynold Leming, referencing Sherlock Holmes and the importance of data, introducing the Information and Records Management Society - a membership organisation for professionals with a wide range of job titles who are fundamentally in the trade of memory preservation, knowledge management and the protection of information rights, he said:
“It is a craft to which Sherlock Holmes would I think have offered his patronage. To quote from The Adventure of the Copper Beeches: "Data! Data! Data!" he cried impatiently. "I can't make bricks without clay".”
He continued with some further quotes from A Scandal in Bohemia:
"For many years he had adopted a system of docketing all paragraphs concerning men and things, so that it was difficult to name a subject or a person on which he could not at once furnish information”
"It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts".
Concluding:
“Our records contain both the information to guide us and the evidence of what we have done. They must be both protected and leveraged, balancing innovation with lawfulness and ethics. The role of our Society [IRMS} is to provide resources, education and community for our members, along with external advocacy, including particularly via this Campaign, to ensure there is investment in the profession and that it operates within a modern and robust legal framework.”
Support from the APPG for Archives and History
Chris Evans, MP for Islwyn, then spoke about the importance of preserving records and archives to fight against the era of misinformation and ‘fake news’ which dominated the period between 2016 to 2020.
He said that ‘archives have a pivotal role to play’ and praised archivists, and others that work in the sector, calling them ‘the holders of truth’. He also called for appropriate investment in the recordkeeping sector to ensure that digital records across the public sector can deliver the vital records and evidence required by the public to rebuild and sustain trust in government. He finished by saying: “I believe that the collection and preservation of Archives and Records is vital for assessing historical ‘truths’ and the way we have remembered events. Archives and Records aid us in connecting with our personal, local, national, and global pasts and help us to understand our present. It is vital we continue to protect archives and records for generations to come, so they too can learn from the past and to continue learning from our shared histories.”
You can read more on Chris Evans’ blog here.
Speakers highlight the importance of archives and records to history and good governance
Richard Ovenden, Bodley’s Librarian at the University of Oxford then highlighted the importance of digital preservation and the challenge posed by the ‘private superpowers’ that are the big tech companies:
He said:
“This poses a huge challenge for us all. The tech industry has increasing power and control over this data generated by all of us every time we go online (and when we aren’t even aware of it). The financial power this dominance gives them allows big tech to innovate at a pace that the public sector struggles to keep up with. Regulation often lags behind the rapidity of change in the industry, and archives and libraries are no different. I have argued in the pages of the FT and elsewhere for a ‘memory tax’ to be levied on the profits of the tech industry to fund the preservation and fair access to digital records. Colleagues: we need to think more broadly across the policy landscape than regulation alone – the knowledge infrastructure of our society must be protected. Like a safe water supply, society needs to be able to rely on a safe reservoir of knowledge, one that is not subject to a tech sector that often behaves like the medieval church – stretching across political jurisdictions, with immense wealth, and the ability to see into our souls!
We can only hold those in power to account if we have access to the records of their behaviour, their decision-making, and the discussions with their advisors and staff. This issue has, of course, come to be at the heart of much of the hottest political controversies of recent times: who made what decisions, when, and why around the management of the Covid-19 pandemic for example. The keeping of records is intimately connected to the good conduct of governments, not just so that the administration of government business can be efficiently carried out, but so that the electorate can hold those officials to account, to ensure that their obligations are understood, and that they have been followed.”
He went on to highlight the role of the Digital Preservation Coalition and the importance of long term planning: “We [the DPC] are now over a hundred organisations, and a few years ago we were joined by the UK Nuclear Decommissioning Authority. They have to think hard about access to knowledge over the long-term! As nuclear waste is dangerous for thousands of years, society long into the future needs to know a vast amount of information about what nuclear waste is buried in what location, when it was placed there, what containers it was stored in, and so on. I repeat: for society to know where it is going, it needs to know where it has come from. Long-term thinking in public policy terms, must come back into fashion.”
In rounding off his speech he gave five reasons why the role of libraries and archives is of great importance to society, and need to be supported:
They are essential tools for educating our fellow citizens, providing access to knowledge, mostly free of charge and open to all, helping to level up society, providing opportunity for all to learn, understand, and become both curious and sceptical.
They are places where a diversity of knowledge can be encountered – not just the prevailing opinions of the echo chambers in which we live, but places where new knowledge can be encountered, were new ideas can challenge received opinion.
Libraries and archives support the well-being of citizens and the principles of an open society through the preservation of key rights and encouraging integrity in decision-making. Archives can be ‘fortifications in the defence of one’s rights’, as citizens of the former East Germany understood when they insisted on access to the former Stasi archives.
In an age of disinformation and misinformation, libraries and archives are reference points for facts and truth, where knowledge can be consulted, cited and verified and relied upon.
They are places where the identities of individuals, communities, and society are preserved and celebrated, whether through local history in our villages, towns and counties, or through celebrating the cultures of diaspora communities who have come to enrich the lives of our nation.
He concluded with the hope that George Orwell’s warning in 1984, does not come true:
‘The past was erased, the erasure was forgotten, the lie became truth.’
You can read Richard’s full speech here.
The next to speak was Jon Baines who advises on data protection and freedom of information law, at the law firm Mishcon de Reya. He is also, separately, chair of the National Association of Data Protection and Freedom of Information Officers and as such as a depth knowledge of the statutory scheme for Freedom of Information. His speech, therefore, concentrated on this important aspect of the campaign.
Referring to the judgement made in 2022 that refused an application for judicial review of the legality of the government’s use of instant messaging technologies for official business he put forward a number of questions about the role of the Information Commissioner in providing relevant guidance and enforcement where the law is unable to. He said:
“We [also] know that the Information Commissioner recognises this: in November 2021 his office published guidance on "Official information held in non-corporate communications channels", observing at the time that "The use of non-corporate communications channels for official business is an issue that has arisen across a range of sectors [but] such channels create a number of risks and potential challenges to compliance [with the law]".
That guidance was helpful, but what did not accompany it, and what has not tended to emanate from Wilmslow (where the Commissioner is based) is robust action to improve things.”
Jon continued to say:
“… what I would like to propose is that our current regulatory regime could do more and could be better used to improve records management.
Most of the Freedom of Information Act is given over to making and responding to specific requests for information. However, at section 46, the Secretary of State is tasked with preparing a Code of Practice "providing guidance to relevant authorities as to the practice which it would, in his opinion, be desirable for them to follow in connection with the keeping, management and destruction of their records" including on "the practice to be adopted in relation to the transfer of records under the Public Records Act 1958 or the Public Records Act (Northern Ireland) 1923 and the practice of reviewing records before they are transferred under those provision" (this is commonly known as the "section 46 Code").
The most recent section 46 Code was issued by the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport in 2021. The Information Commissioner is tasked with "promoting the observance by public authorities of the Code". And while the Commissioner doesn't have actual enforcement powers in relation to the Code, he can give formal "Practice Recommendations" to public authorities who are not, in his assessment, conforming with the Code. When he does so he must first consult with the Keeper of Public Records. Yet, as far as I know, since the Act commenced in 2000, the ICO has served only one such (in respect of the section 46 Code), and that was as far back as 2007, on Nottingham City Council.”
Jon went on to ask a series of questions:
“Why, also, do we not see the Commissioner suggesting to underperforming public authorities that he (with the National Archives assistance) can conduct a consensual audit of their records management (under section 47 of the FOIA)?
Why are practice recommendations and audits not deployed more? Is it because the Commissioner doesn't see records management as an area needing improvement? (I don't think that can be right, given the guidance I referred to earlier).
Does he lack resources? (If so, I have not heard him, or his predecessors, clamour for more in this area).”
But concluded:
“No, I fear that – over the years – the Commissioner has – oddly, perhaps perversely, given the issues we are discussing tonight – come to see records management as less and less relevant to his functions. The result of this is that one regularly sees statements in formal notices in relation to FOI requests along these lines "The FOI Act cannot require a public authority to change its systems, although the Commissioner may make an adverse comment if she believes there is evidence of particularly poor record handling". When clearly her (now his) powers are more than this.
And we have the rather odd situation that the Commissioner has not updated his guidance on the section 46 Code since 2016, despite the fact that – as mentioned earlier – the most recent Code post-dates this by five years.
So my brief observation, and suggestion, tonight is that the FOI Act, and the Information Commissioner, could contribute more than they do to the pressing issues facing records in the UK. I would suggest that the Campaign – to the extent it has not already – work to get the Commissioner on board, and cajole him into doing more.”
You can read more of John’s thoughts on FOI and Information Governance on his blog here [LINK ] and the Mishcon de Reya blog here.
Minister for Arts & Heritage - Lord Parkinson of Whitely Bay - emphasises the importance of archives and records
The final speaker of the evening was Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay, Minister for Arts & Heritage and DCMS Minister in the Lords. He opened by saying how important archives were to him personally as a history graduate, and how useful they had been to him in his career as a Government advisor. Particularly referring to his time at the Home Office under Theresa May he mentioned the importance of records in the inquiries into the death of Stephen Lawrence, Hillsborough, the death of Daniel Morgan and the Historic Child Sexual Abuse Inquiry. He also talked about how vital recordkeeping was to the ongoing inquiries into Contaminated Blood, Grenfell and COVID-19 saying
“The past is very present, so it is very important that we look after the records.”
Referencing the age of ‘contested truth’ he spoke about the sanctity of records and their role in preserving ‘sacred facts’. Referencing Richard Ovenden’s Orwellian quote he talked about how the Russian’s were targeting archives in Ukraine with the specific aim of erasing history and replacing it with their own ‘warped version of the truth’.
Whilst caveating that he was speaking within his DCMS remit (and much of government records management falls to the Cabinet Office) he highlighted initiatives that were improving both recordkeeping and access to records:
The UK Government webarchive – this holds information published since 1996 and has 6.5 billion digital files, including 3 million social media posts from 1,000 government accounts.
New technology developed by the UK National Archives which allows the transfer of digital records on a little and often basis using a proprietary technology that allows government workers to upload, prepare, digitise and transfer records to the UK National Archives
The availability of a wide range of Case law from court judgements and higher tribunals that has been made available using the same digital transfer technology. In some cases court judgements are available for public access within hours of the judgement being made.
Lord Parkinson also sought to reassure the assembled guests that DCMS continued to work with the UK National Archives in the updating of codes of practice and guidelines and that the Cabinet Office were currently revising guidance regarding non-corporate channels – having last updated this in 2013.
You can find out more about the campaign here https://www.campaignforrecords.org/
If you would like to get involved in the campaign or provide a guest blog please email info@campaignforrecords.org