§ Mr. BakerTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the date and title of the oldest document or614W archival unit retained by his Department which has not been passed on to the Public Record Office for release for public inspection. [7200]
§ Mrs. Liddell[holding answer 8 July 1997]: The oldest retained file in the Treasury is entitled "Air Ministry re-employment of Retired Officers". It ends in 1938 and is retained under the Security and intelligence "blanket".
Retained files in the Treasury are in the process of being re-reviewed under the Open Government Initiative. It is expected that all those in the Treasury will have undergone this process by April 1998.