The nation's memory

This building in Canberra houses the Australian National Archives. Many years ago I used to teach archivists, and I have great respect for the important role they play in preserving our collective memory.

The National Archives are though in desperate trouble. They don’t have the funds to undertake urgent digitisation and preservation of the unique records they hold – 384 kms of them. Paper and film records are disintegrating, audio tapes becoming inaudible, digital records are in obsolete formats that can’t be retrieved. There are huge backlogs in processing requests for access to records from researchers. I read that one academic at least advises doctoral students to avoid topics that would require working with archives, because they won’t be able to access the materials they need.

In March the Government received the report of a review of the National Archives. It recommended an immediate allocation of $67.7m just to save the most urgent and at risk materials. The Government said it ‘won’t be rushed’ and increased the Archives’ operating budget by $700,000.

Why are the Archives so undervalued? In part no doubt because it’s difficult to promote archives as sexy and exciting, and they lack clout in the competition for budget dollars. I wonder if it is also because Governments, and certainly the present one, have an instinctive reluctance to share information. Or do they just not care about history?

The building by the way is the East Block, built in 1925 and one the three buildings in the original parliamentary triangle. At one time it housed the Canberra Post Office and was the point from which distances from Canberra were measured.

'Murrulangalang' means rock caves where cultural knowledge is stored.