Annual Report 2019–20 Annual Report 2019–2020
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NSW STATE ARCHIVES & RECORDS ANNUAL REPORT 2019–20 ANNUAL REPORT 2019–2020 1 NSW STATE ARCHIVES & RECORDS ANNUAL REPORT 2019–20 Annual Report 2019–20 ISSN 0545-3593 State Archives and Records Authority of New South Wales PO Box 516 Kingswood NSW 2747 Published 2020, written and edited in-house. Design and editorial support provided by Sydney Living Museums. Available in PDF format at records.nsw.gov.au © State of New South Wales through the State Archives and Records Authority of New South Wales, 2020. You may copy, distribute, display, download and otherwise freely deal with this work for any purpose provided that you attribute the State Archives and Records Authority of New South Wales as the owner. However, you must obtain permission if you wish to (1) charge others for access to the work (other than at cost), (2) include the work in advertising or as a product for sale or (3) modify the work. As at 30 June 2020 the State Archives and Records Authority of New South Wales is a statutory body within the Department of Premier and Cabinet (DPC) cluster. Cover: From the State Archives Collection, featured in the exhibition A Thousand Words. NSW State Archives INTRODUCTION LETTER TO THE MINISTER The Hon. Don Harwin, MLC Minister for the Public Service and Employee Relations, Aboriginal Affairs, and the Arts GPO Box 5341 SYDNEY NSW 2001 Dear Minister On behalf of the State Archives and Records Authority of New South Wales, I am pleased to forward the Annual Report and Financial Statement of the Authority for the year ended 30 June 2020. This report has been prepared in accordance with the requirements of the Annual Report (Statutory Bodies) Act 1984, the Public Finance and Audit Act 1983 and the Regulations under those Acts. Yours sincerely Adam Lindsay Executive Director State Archives and Records Authority of New South Wales Date: 1 October 2020 Image: Nurses Register before conservation treatment. Photo © NSW State Archives i NSW STATE ARCHIVES & RECORDS ANNUAL REPORT 2019–20 Conservation work, handling a glass-plate negative. Photo © NSW State Archives ii TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS Executive Director’s Report 2 5. Other reporting requirements 52 1 5. Annual report preparation 52 Message from the Chair 4 5.2 Events after the reporting period 52 1. About NSW State Archives 5.3 Nil to report 52 and Records 6 5.4 Accessing SARA’s services 52 1 1. Our vision 6 1.2 Who we are 6 6. Financial report 54 1.3 Our stakeholders 6 1 6. Financial highlights 54 1.4 What we do 6 6.2 Consultants 54 1.5 How we do this 7 6.3 Gross revenue raised from the sale of goods and services 54 2. Performance, highlights 6.4 Annual reporting of payment & achievements 8 of accounts 55 1 2. Key achievements 8 6.5 Accounts due and paid within 2.2 Performance summary 9 each quarter 55 2.3 State of public sector Independent auditor’s report 56 recordkeeping 10 2.4 State Archives Collection 14 Financial statements 58 2.5 Commercial services 26 Compliance checklist 98 2.6 Information management 28 3. Corporate overview 29 1 3. Board of NSW State Archives and Records 29 3.2 Legislation 31 3.3 Organisational structure 32 3.4 Advisory committees 33 4. Governance & accountability 34 1 4. Managing our people 34 4.2 Internal audit and risk management 41 4.3 Public Interest Disclosures Act 1994 (PID Act) 42 4.4 Government Information (Public Access) Act 2009 (GIPA Act) 42 4.5 Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act 1998 (PPIP Act) 50 4.6 Complaints 51 1 NSW STATE ARCHIVES & RECORDS ANNUAL REPORT 2019–20 EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR’S REPORT The past 12 months have been challenging, but also rewarding and successful for the State Archives and Records Authority of New South Wales (SARA). Some of the key highlights and achievements from this year have included the accession of $17 million worth of items into the State Archives Collection (the Collection), bringing the current valuation of the Collection to $1.03 billion. We commenced the barcoding of the Collection, with approximately 45% of the Collection barcoded at container level by the end of the financial year. This brings an unprecedented level of sophistication and accuracy to our control of one of the state’s premier cultural assets. Under SARA’s digitisation program, a total of 235,312 digital preservation files were ingested into the State Archives Management System and made available to the public during the year. Over 900,000 new items from the Collection were made discoverable online, a demonstration of our commitment to access. We published seven new disposal authorities and updated four others to increase coverage and reduce complexity in records disposal for public offices. By year end, 95% of public offices had achieved comprehensive records retention and disposal coverage. SARA invested strongly in the improvement of our infrastructure this year. Major features of our capital works program include the commission of a 364-kilowatt solar power system at the Western Sydney Records Centre (WSRC), matched to the site’s winter peak-usage level, and the upgrade of one of our storage cells to achieve the long- term goal of providing purpose-designed storage for SARA’s oversized volumes. SARA’s commercial arm, the Government Records Repository, took on the management of 25,338 linear metres of incoming records during the year, with total holdings growing to 660,533 linear metres. The team digitised more than six million images for clients within a seven-hour service level as part of the Scan-on- Demand offering and finished the year in a very strong financial position with a net result of $6.6 million generated from a record revenue of $21.3 million. This equates to a return on earnings of almost 31% and a 1.4% growth in commercial holdings. Although the impact of COVID-19 was felt through the closure of the WSRC Reading Room from 24 March to 2 June 2020, online services continued and new engagement initiatives and activities were developed, including mini webinars, behind- the-scenes videos and online jigsaw puzzles. 2 EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR’S REPORT SARA supported public offices through publishing I would like to acknowledge the Hon Don scenario-based guidance on the creation of Harwin, MLC, Minister for the Arts, for his COVID-19-related records and their retention continued support and advocacy of SARA and periods, and ongoing consultation with our SLM throughout this year. Thank you, Minister. national and international counterparts. Finally, thank you to our Board Chair, Deputy In 2018, we commenced a review of the State Chair, Members, staff and volunteers for your Records Act 1998, and this review continued during dedication to, and passion for, SARA; your efforts the 2019–20 financial year, with SARA undertaking have culminated in an excellent year. I look forward extensive consultation with key government to sharing the exciting year ahead with you. and private stakeholders. This culminated in the production of a policy paper that was referred to the upper house Standing Committee on Social Issues for consideration. The outcome of the committee’s Adam Lindsay inquiry into our review of the Act is anticipated EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR to be presented in the latter half of 2020. State Archives and Records Authority of New South Wales On 1 July 2020, we marked 12 months of partnership with Sydney Living Museums (SLM). The successes and benefits of the partnership have been evident in so many of our achievements this year, in particular, the combined expertise of our dedicated staff and the expansive collections of both institutions in the delivery of the exhibition A Thousand Words. The central philosophy of this exhibition was a bold one, founded in the belief that history belongs to everyone because we are all living it as every moment fades into the next. Extending that further, we all have agency to interpret history, and this exhibition invited everyone to do just that. Engaging audiences from all over the world in a social media campaign, the user-generated content became a featured component of the exhibition experience. Access to state-owned assets is important. When these assets are cultural, access needs to be facilitated in a way that is democratic – and sometimes this means presenting content, stories and material in bold, new and unorthodox ways. The creative and democratic approach of A Thousand Words in presenting our history exemplifies the future ambitions of SLM and SARA’s forward-thinking partnership. The next 12 months will see our partnership with SLM deepen significantly. We will share more resources – building on the combined finance, human resources, groundskeeping and workplace health and safety teams – delivering sustainable outcomes for both organisations, as well as varied and meaningful development opportunities for team members. We will leverage SLM’s incredible insight and infrastructure to create more opportunities for education, programming, exhibitions and digital content that will share the State Archives Collection with more people than ever before. 3 NSW STATE ARCHIVES & RECORDS ANNUAL REPORT 2019–20 MESSAGE FROM THE CHAIR In numerous ways, the past year has been defined by the extensive impacts of COVID-19. Changing how the people of NSW socialise, work and conduct business, the pandemic is unparalleled in living memory but has prompted reflection on the 1918–19 Spanish flu. Casting our minds back has been facilitated directly by the preservation of records and artefacts of the time in collecting institutions such as the State Archives and Records Authority of New South Wales (SARA). Despite the challenges of the current times, the extraordinary staff at SARA have continued to fulfil their important roles and deliver great work.