ISB BID SUCCESS
A2A is delighted to announce the success of its £697,000
bid to the Invest to Save Budget. The result, announced
by Mo Mowlam in a press conference held at the Cabinet
Office on Thursday 17 February, will enable the creation
of the infrastructure for the English national archive
network at the Public Record Office between April 2000 and
March 2002. The award of the total amount sought will
allow the central body to undertake the overall control
and enforcement of standards; provide expertise in
information technology; manage offshore keying contracts
and mount the resulting archival data on the World Wide
Web. The success of the bid will mean the retrospective
conversion of about 400,000 pages of existing hard-copy
catalogues of records of national, regional and local
importance, and dating from between the twelfth and
twentieth centuries, which are held in local archive
offices in England. Regional consortia bids to the Heritage
Lottery Fund (HLF) are already in preparation co-ordinated
by the A2A Steering Group.
By awarding the total amount, government has recognised
that the new network will provide the efficient delivery
of access to archive services in electronic form to
citizens in their homes, offices and schools, and to the
many people overseas who are interested in English history
and culture. With over 160 repositories already committed
to some form of participation, the project is a real
example of 'joined-up government' in action. The network
will also become a new component of the growing creative
cultural economy within England, and enable archives to
make a significant contribution to the learning society
A2A is a consortium of the Public Record Office (PRO), the
British Library (BL) and the Royal Commission on
Historical Manuscripts (HMC), supported by the National
Council on Archives, the Society of Archivists and the
Association of Chief Archivists in Local Government.
Margaret Procter
Communications Officer, A2A Steering Group
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http://www.pro.gov.uk/a2a/
Tel: 0151 794 2411
Fax: 0151 794 2366
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