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GOVERNMENT RECORDS ENTER THE 'STONE AGE' The National Archives of Australia is introducing a brave new world of recordkeeping called e-permanence that will have long term benefits for government agencies. Using the image of a stone to symbolise the enduring nature of information captured as records, e-permanence heralds the arrival of best practice modern recordkeeping to Commonwealth government agencies. It will be launched by the Secretary of the Department of Defence, Dr Allan Hawke, at the Archives on Thursday, 30 March at 5.30 pm. The Director-General of the National Archives, George Nichols, said today that the groundbreaking recordkeeping standards to be promoted through the e-permanence campaign, would confront the genuine dangers of Australia losing its government memory, and of government agencies being unable to do business effectively or be properly accountable to Parliament. In conceiving e-permanence to control the diverse communication, e-commerce and other business needs of government agencies, the National Archives has taken the leading role in setting standards and providing training in recordkeeping. Mr Nichols said that e-permanence would provide significant support for agencies working to meet the Prime Minister's 1997 pledge to move government information and services online by 2001. 'In an age when information is becoming the currency of the corporate world, the need for modern recordkeeping standards has become critical. Such standards are essential across government agencies to ensure that information is captured and packaged in a way that allows it to be recalled, communicated, shared and exploited many times over,' Mr Nichols said. 'Adoption of the new standards will ensure that recordkeeping is integrated into business processes, allowing it to happen automatically. This is particularly critical when doing business on-line so that evidence of e-commerce transactions is captured into official recordkeeping systems, ' he said. The products to be launched are now available on the Archives website at http://www.naa.gov.au/ They include metadata standards to aid retrieval of information online, web based tools for making information and records more accessible, comprehensive advice on designing and implementing systems and guidelines on records disposal, storage and preservation. For further information please refer to our website http://www.naa.gov.au/ or contact: Steve Stuckey Assistant Director-General National Archives of Australia Tel (02) 6212 3942 or Michael Byrne Tel: (02) 6251 2689 0412 690 429 [log in to unmask]