§ Mr. Newensasked the Attorney-General if he will review the ruling made in 1967 for post-1945 documents mentioning intelligence organisation to be retained in closed files for periods longer than 30 years; and whether, in the absence of a review of this ruling, all such documents will be withheld from public access for a period of 75 years.
The Attorney-GeneralThere has already been such a review. In his answer to the question by my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr. Rooker) on 5 February—[Vol. 962, c.17–8]—my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs said that where there is no other reason for withholding documents of this kind which are outside the "closed" period for public records they will be transferred to the Public Record Office and opened to public inspection.