1. > INTRODUCTION

This guide provides best practice advice for public offices and local authorities to develop strategies to manage their websites as public or local authority records. It articulates key principles for managing websites as records and, based on an analysis of website technology, assesses a range of recordkeeping strategies that organisations can use. The expected audience is developers, vendors, purchasers and implementers of websites and this guide assumes a familiarity with website technologies.

Good recordkeeping by public offices and local authorities is fundamental to a well-functioning democracy since it provides the mechanism whereby the public sector can account for its decisions and actions to Government and its citizens. Records also provide evidence for citizens to confirm or claim their rights and entitlements as well as providing individual public servants with evidence to justify their decisions. Moreover, good recordkeeping is simply good business practice.

Recordkeeping systems facilitate:

• efficiency, by making information readily available when needed for decision-making and operational activities;
• sound use of financial resources, by allowing timely disposal of non-current records;
• accountability, by enabling the creation of a complete and authoritative record of official activities;
• compliance, by demonstrating that legal requirements have been met; and
• risk mitigation, by managing the risks associated with illegal loss or destruction of records, and from inappropriate or unauthorised access to records.

All data or documents that are transmitted or published by public office or local authority websites are public records or local authority records and subject to the requirements of the Public Records Act 2005.

Public offices and local authorities should capture all data and documents that are published or transmitted by websites into recordkeeping systems.

For public offices, these must be actively maintained until, under authorisation of the Chief Archivist, they are either destroyed or transferred to Archives New Zealand for long-term preservation.

For local authorities, where this includes local authority protected records, these must be actively maintained until, under the authorisation of the Chief Archivist, they are either disposed of or transferred to the control of the Chief Archivist.