House of Assembly Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2) 52 2 Parliament of South Australia House of Assembly published Question Time State Records STATE RECORDS Mr MARSHALL House of Assembly Norwood Leader of the Opposition STATE RECORDS Mr MARSHALL (Norwood—Leader of the Opposition) (14:35): This is supplementary to that. So, you're saying that, if that is wiped, they would need to get approval from the Director of State Records to destroy those same records? The Hon. J.R. RAU House of Assembly Enfield Deputy Premier Attorney-General Minister for Planning Minister for Industrial Relations Minister for Business Services and Consumers STATE RECORDS The Hon. J.R. RAU (Enfield—Deputy Premier, Attorney-General, Minister for Planning, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister for Business Services and Consumers) (14:36): No, I'm not saying that at all. It basically works like this: under the State Records Act, there are some things which are deemed to be a state record and there are some things that are not. So, that is the first dividing line: is it a state record or is it not? Then, beyond that, if it is a state record, not all state records are required to be held permanently. Some records are required to be held for a short period, and then there are five-year periods and so on. So, there are varying periods of retention required. There is a destruction schedule, which is document 18 (I can't remember the acronym for it, but the leader knows what I am talking about), and that document is a document which is prepared in consultation with the State Records people, and it prescribes the circumstances in which material may be destroyed. Because a machine is wiped does not mean necessarily that the material is destroyed, because the material may be removed from the machine, placed in a storage facility of some description, whether that is hard copy or hard drives, or whatever it might be, and then the destruction of the hard drive occurs. I think that it is important for the parliament to understand: the mere destruction of a memory on a computer does not in and of itself indicate that there has been a destruction of an official record.