§ Mr. Raymond S. RobertsonTo ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will make a statement about his plans to establish the Scottish Record Office as a next steps agency.
§ Mr. LangI informed the House on 5 February that the Scottish Record Office was to be established as a next steps agency. It is to be launched as an agency on 1 April.
I have set the Scottish Record Office the following key targets for its first year of operation:
Efficiency
to reduce the unit cost of preserving and making available the records of Scotland by 8 per cent.;Quality of Service
to increase the number of catalogue pages available for public scrutiny on the electronic system from 24,600 in 1992–93 to 30,740 in 1993–94;to maintain the recently achieved standards of reader services: material produced for readers in 30 minutes or less in 90 per cent. of cases.90 per cent. of photocopying for legal customers produced in 24 hours,95 per cent. of correspondence dealt with in 10 days, while absorbing an expected 2 per cent. increase in demand.Effectiveness
to survey the electronic and paper based information systems as a first step towards agreeing standards for the transfer of electronic records to the SRO.The Keeper of the Records of Scotland as the agency's chief executive will be directly accountable to me for the agency's achievements.I have placed a copy of the agency's framework document in the Libraries of both Houses.