Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

The State and the National Archives have considerable experience of the storage and retention of paper records and it is a credit to the Civil Service over the years that very good files have been retained, maintained and transferred to the National Archives, which has been very important for historians.

We have considerably less experience of the retention and storage of electronic records and I appreciate that the Taoiseach has set out the way in which records are kept electronically and backed up. What assurance do we have that these records will survive in electronic format and future historians, when they come to consider documents under the 30-year rule, will still have the range of material available to them as they have had up to now?

I heard the Taoiseach's reply to Deputy Kenny with regard to the National Archives advisory council, which has not been in place since November 2007. This kind of body is required now to advise on what is a major transition from paper to electronic record keeping. I would have thought that it is at this time a body like that, particularly if it included technical expertise, would be exactly what is required. Is it not the case that the proposed merger of the National Archives, the National Library and the Irish Manuscripts Commission will make this position worse? I do not understand how the merging of the National Archives and the National Library will improve the keeping of records and their retention.

Regarding contemporary records, an issue arose when the Ryan report was published, in that material was available to the commission but not included in the report. The records of the interviews and accounts given by victims of abuse should be retained, so can we have an assurance to this effect and that they will be available in the National Archives?

Will the Taoiseach assure the House that the records being created in respect of NAMA will be retained for future reference?

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