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Dear All, I published this blog post this morning. I had been working on it over the weekend and I thought the list would be interested in it. As you may know the Goddard Inquiry was preceded by other reviews into government records. In particular, you may recall Tom Watson’s claims to Parliament about a paedophile ring at the heart of Westminster raised the profile of the Dickens Dossier. In response, the government reviewed its files for the dossier. The review indicated files were missing or lost, which indicated weak records management. After the revelations of 22 July 2015, I decided to take a closer look at the reviews and their terms of reference. You will recall that in January 2015, a researcher discovered a document that was sent to Margaret Thatcher. It contained allegations about a number of senior politicians including Leon Brittan. The document challenged the Wanless Review's thoroughness. According to Wanless and Cottam, the Wanless Report authors, the subsequent searches by the Home Office and the Cabinet Office did not change the report’s conclusion. However, they did point to the limited terms of reference that guided their work. Several questions emerged. Why they were drawn so narrowly? Why were the National Archives not involved in either of the reviews? Why did the government not use the government’s archival and records management experts? The National Archives are perhaps the world’s best archives with top experts, yet they were not consulted on a major records management and archival issue. Why? If you are interested, the blog is found here: https://lawrenceserewicz.wordpress.com/2015/08/10/when-the-whitewash-of-a-cover-up-unravels-why-archives-matter/ Best, Lawrence ________________________________ Help protect our environment by only printing this email if absolutely necessary. The information it contains and any files transmitted with it are confidential and are only intended for the person or organisation to whom it is addressed. It may be unlawful for you to use, share or copy the information, if you are not authorised to do so. If you receive this email by mistake, please inform the person who sent it at the above address and then delete the email from your system. Durham County Council takes reasonable precautions to ensure that its emails are virus free. However, we do not accept responsibility for any losses incurred as a result of viruses we might transmit and recommend that you should use your own virus checking procedures. Contact the list owner for assistance at [log in to unmask] For information about joining, leaving and suspending mail (eg during a holiday) see the list website at https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A0=archives-nra