Portfolio Budget Statement 2019–2020
Our statement sets out how we intend to expend our annual appropriation.
AIATSIS was appropriated $20.371 million to support our functions as we pursue the strategic
goals set out in the AIATSIS Corporate Plan, and deliver the outcome expressed in the statement.
The statement sets a single outcome for AIATSIS:
Further understanding of Australian Indigenous cultures, past and present, through undertaking and publishing research, and providing access to print and audiovisual collections.
Corporate Plan 2019–2023
Our corporate plan sets out how we intend to achieve our vision and fulfil our mission.
The plan outlines the operating environment and key challenges and identifies five strategic
priorities, with key outcomes, planned actions (strategies), and performance criteria,
measures and targets.
These strategic priorities are:
- Build and preserve a national collection and make it accessible.
- Promote better understanding of Indigenous peoples, cultures and heritage.
- Lead and influence on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander research, ethics, protocols, and collections.
- Partner and collaborate with our communities, partners and governments.
- Advise on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and heritage.
Summary analysis of performance
Results over the past year are consistent with our strategic priorities.
- We continued growing our collection, progressing its digitisation and making the collection discoverable and accessible.
- Significant results in the promotion of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture and heritage through education were the launch of two major new school education resources and the ongoing rollout of AIATSIS Core Cultural Competency online training for the workplace.
- Our achievements and leadership in research practice and standards were recognised in the demand for our ethics review services, and the establishment of an Indigenous Research Exchange. Our partnership approach supported outcomes across our business, including the achievements of the Return of Cultural Heritage Project and the formation of new strategic partnerships and partnership projects with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities and peer organisations.
- Goals for input to relevant policy were also achieved.
Factors affecting our performance included the pandemic and bushfires, increasing demand for preservation and access to our collection, the shifting ethical framework for collecting and research, growing self-determination in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, increasing domestic and international demand for all of our services and pressures on our technical, human and space resources.
- COVID-19 pandemic. Measures to limit the spread of COVID-19, both in Canberra and into Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, affected our business on a number of fronts. The Stanner reading room was closed from March 2020 until the end of the financial year and the National Native Title Conference scheduled to be held in for Tweed Heads (NSW) in May 2020 was postponed. Measures to protect staff included working from home which affected productivity during the transition and had an ongoing impact on work that requires the use of specialised onsite equipment. Travel restrictions and other precautions prevented field research and events from March onward.
- Natural disasters. The bushfires during December and January and the subsequent smoke haze over Canberra affected some communities that we are in partnership with for research projects, as well as presenting challenges and pressures for the protection and safety of our collection. Smoke haze necessitated the closure of the reading room for a period in January.
- Increased pressure for preservation and access. While we are making good progress in many areas, pressure still grows to achieve preservation of the most fragile and vulnerable materials within the collection. There is also an increased expectation of digital delivery of, discoverability of and access to the collection.
- A changing environment for ethical practice in collections and research. Expectations for the ethical management of cultural material and information continue to shift. The ethical implications of the collection, and the management and use of data is an area of ongoing development, and communities and individuals increasingly demand control and management of their own data and information. This was reflected in very high levels of engagement in consultation on the Guidelines for Ethical Research in Australian Indigenous Studies.
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander self-determination. There is growing demand from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities for control and management of their own materials held within cultural collections. Collection management and research is expected to occur in partnership, with shared priority-setting, design and decision-making.
- Increasing demand for AIATSIS expertise, resources, advice and information on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, traditions, history and cultural heritage. There is an ever growing demand in Australia, and internationally, for authoritative content and advice on research and collection management. This is driven by growing interest and expectations across the community, including the education sector, and by the resurgence of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture and society.
- Limits to capacity. We are responding to opportunities and threats through evolving technologies and technical capabilities, but still dealing with limits to physical storage capacity and technological and human resources.