§ Mr. RedmondTo ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what assessment the Public Record Office has made of the contribution made by family historians and genealogists to the world of archives and records in the United Kingdom since 1979; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. John M. TaylorThe hon. Member's question concerns a specific matter on which the chief executive of the Public Record Office is best placed to provide an answer and I have accordingly asked the chief executive, the Keeper of Public Records, to reply direct.
Letter from Sarah Tyacke to Mr. Martin Redmond, dated 30 November 1992:
As Chief Executive of the Public Record Office I am answering your Parliamentary Question, since it is a matter delegated to me under the terms of the Agency's Framework Document.My responsibilities as the Keeper of Public Records in the world of archives and records in the United Kingdom principally involve the supervision of the care and preservation of public records, as defined in the Public Records Acts and the management of the Public Record Office. The public records include those in places outside the Public Record Office appointed as places of deposit, for the most part local authority record offices. Such local places of deposit are under the management of the responsible local or other authority; and they hold many other historical records which are used by family historians and benefit greatly from their voluntary activities in cataloguing and indexing such records. The wider ambit of local record offices and other repositories means that it would not be appropriate for the Public Record Office to make an assessment of the kind which you envisage.Family historians and genealogists have since 1979, and earlier, represented an increasingly strong element in the readership of the Public Record Office as well as other record offices. The Office has well established links with the major societies and other institutions representing interests in this field. It takes into account these interests in its approach to the selection of records. The growing interest in using the records for these purposes has been a major factor in the making of improvements to the finding aids to the records, and in the planning of reader services both at Kew and Chancery Lane, most notably in the opening of new reading rooms at Chancery Lane for the population census returns in 1990, in their expansion in 1991, and their opening on Saturdays from July 1992.Family history interest is represented on the Advisory Council on Public Records and also among the Friends of the Public Record Office, set up in 1988, whose secretary is currently also a member of the Advisory Council. Much valuable work is being undertaken by volunteers, many of whom are family historians, under the aegis of the Friends, in indexing and listing records in the Public Record Office. The contribution made by family historians is thus of considerable benefit in the field of historical research.
§ Mr. RedmondTo ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what arrangements he is considering to safeguard county record offices for local historians and genealogists in the event of local government reorganisation; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. John M. TaylorNo decisions have yet been made on local government reorganisation in either England or Wales. It is, therefore, too early to be able to assess the implications of reorganisation for county record offices. In the context of the Lord Chancellor's responsibility for public records, the Lord Chancellor will in due course be198W considering any advice offered to him by his Advisory Council on Public Records about any implications for the provision of archive services.