Appraisal and Disposal Information

What happens to our nation’s records?

Every day, each New Zealand public (ie. central government) office creates or receives an enormous number of records. It is not practical or necessary to keep every individual record. However, it is important to identify and preserve those records that:

document the rights and entitlements of our citizens
enable the efficient and accountable operation of our government and
preserve information about our national history for future generations.

The process of identifying which records are important and should be preserved is called appraisal.

The process of deciding who should look after the records or what to do with them is called disposal.

Under the Public Records Act 2005, no one may dispose of a public record without authorisation from the Chief Archivist, Archives New Zealand.

Archives New Zealand has an open and transparent process in place which ensures that members of the public are able to:

comment on the Chief Archivist’s intention to approve the disposal of public records, and
understand the basis on which the Chief Archivist will approve a disposal recommendation.

Once this process is complete, the Chief Archivist’s final approval is given through the issue of a disposal authority to a public office. All current Disposal Authorities can be accessed via Archway.

Information for public offices can be viewed on the Continuum website at Records appraisal and disposal.