Yates Dianne: Public Records Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
Yates Dianne: Public Records Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:625;Page:19988] 
DIANNE YATES (Labour—Hamilton East) 
:  
As the chair of the Government Administration Committee I am pleased to speak on the Public Records Bill. I will read from the report back because although the previous speaker may have read the minority report from National I want to read what we said as a committee: “We also note that State enterprises can withhold access to records on the basis of commercial sensitivity under the Official Information Act 1982 (subject to a public interest test) and they will continue to exercise this discretion under the bill. We also note that the Chief Archivist can provide advice or issue standards to assist public offices in determining whether there are good reasons to restrict access to their records.” I think that covers the point. The National Party has said that it is unable to support the bill and that matters are unresolved but that is only in its opinion. We are talking of course about records that will be released after 25 years. The committee was generally satisfied that there was no commercial sensitivity. We have found that records have not been kept in some cases when it has been necessary for the history of New Zealand that they should have been kept. 
I thank the select committee for the work it did on this bill. It was a very very interesting bill that we enjoyed working on. With regard to universities they already keep more records than are required by this bill. The bill does not apply to academic research or to individual student academic records and that has been made very clear. We asked for definitions around local authorities to be tightened up and we also tightened the legislation regarding the records of public and private schools so that it is very very clear. 
I thank Archives New Zealand for arranging for the select committee to visit. We had a very interesting tour. We were shown the records there how they were kept some of the new processes—Archives New Zealand is coming online—and the new computer system that will increase access to those records. I am very impressed with the work it is doing and with the work it has done on this legislation. I was also very impressed with the way that Archives New Zealand staff worked with the select committee. When we had queries and matters that needed to be tidied up they did that very well. 
 As a committee we made one alteration—we recommended that the fine be increased. We thought that the fine recommended which was $2000 for those who might like to “disappear” a record was not enough of a deterrent so we recommended that the sum be increased because we felt that New Zealand archives are very very important to this country. We discovered that the fine had just been carried over from previous legislation and had not been revised for some years. So that was one alteration the committee initiated. 
Once again I thank everybody on the committee Archives New Zealand in particular and officials and ministry staff for helping us with this bill. I also thank the Minister. The legislation is long overdue; these things do need updating. Mistakes have been made in the past in New Zealand and let us hope that this bill will rectify those mistakes.