Our partners MLA cannot achieve Action for Archives alone. They work across the archives domain to achieve outcomes and objectives. The National Archives
Together, the MLA Partnership and The National Archives share a common vision to make archives better looked after, better used and better undrstood. MLA is a strategic development agency; TNA is a national collecting institution of international significance, preserving the national memory. Both the MLA Partnership and TNA are charged with delivering a wide range of activities to support and develop UK archives to better achieve government and social outcomes. The MLA Partnership has been working with TNA to support Self-assessment for local authority archives, which is gatheirng valuable data and evidence to support service development. We are also working with TNA and the Inter-departmental Archives Committee to develop a new Government Policy for archives. Further details about this major piece of work will be available in summer 2007. The National Archives (TNA) is a Government department and an executive agency, reporting through the Department for Constitutional Affairs. It has statutory duties to select, preserve and make accessible records of central government and the courts of law, and a further remit, inherited through the former Historic Manuscripts Commission, to intervene in matters concerning other types of records held by a wide variety of institutions. It has a clear mandate from government to lead on information policy and records management across public authorities and government, with a particular emphasis on digital records. It’s Chief Executive represents UK archive interests internationally. The Department for Culture, Media & Sport
MLA is a non-departmental public body of the DCMS. The DCMS has a wide ranging remit which includes archives. Senior officers of MLA meet regularly with counterparts in DCMS to develop programmes to support archives and to advocate for archives at the highest level. The National Council on Archives
MLA, together with TNA currently funds The National Council on Archives (NCA) to deliver on specific advocacy activities for archives. The NCA was established in 1988 to bring together the major bodies and organisations, including service providers, users, depositors and policy makers, across the UK concerned with archives and their use. It aims to develop consensus on matters of mutual concern and provide an authoritative common voice for the archival community. MLA provides funding to support the NCA to:
- Provide the Archive Lottery Advice Service which offers advice free of charge advice to applicants considering making grants to the Lottery Funders. The service also runs workshops.
- Advocacy for archives including an annual conference on a topical issue on concern and the annual Archives Awareness Campaign. The theme for 2007 is 'Freedom and Liberty' so look out for archive events this autumn about the Abolition of the British Transatlantic Slave Trade, Indian Independence, and citizenship in the 21st century global village.
- The work of the Public Services Quality Group, which hosts an annual forum in November each year and co-ordinates an annual survey of user satisfaction.
For more information please visit www.nca.online.org.uk and www.archive.awareness.co.uk The Society of Archivists
The Society of Archivists is the principal professional body for archivists, archive conservators and records managers in the United Kingdom and Ireland. MLA is an institutional member of the Society and we work closely with them to develop opportunities for training and development of all those working archives. The Association of Chief Archivists in Local Government
ACALG represents senior service managers in local authority archives. MLA is currently working with ACALG to develop a robust performance and standards framework for archives. The Inter-Departmental Archives Committee The United Kingdom Inter-Departmental Archives Committee (IDAC) was set up in February 1996 as an essential co-ordinating mechanism within government for the handling of archival policy issues. MLA is an observer member of IDAC. United Kingdom Film Heritage Committee and the Film Archive Forum
As a member of both these groups, MLA is working to champion moving image archives and we are working with partners to develop a national strategy for film archives.
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