2. Allegations in the media

  1. On 1 January 2024, The West Australian reported that “the keeper of the nation’s memory [the NAA] does not hold relevant submissions” relating to the decisions to send Australian troops into war in Iraq and could not release them alongside other Cabinet papers. The West Australian reported that it “established the NSC records were physically located within the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, where they had been made available for viewing—but not copying—by the team working on the official histories of the Afghanistan and Iraq conflicts”.9
  2. Further, on 1 and 2 January 2024, The Australian ran a series of articles related to the transfer issue alleging that PM&C’s failure to transfer the Cabinet records, and subsequent non-release of documents to the public, was due to “supreme incompetence by the lead government department or a deliberate cover-up”10 and “shows that the Albanese government was not paying attention”. 11

Footnotes

  1. Katina Curtis, ‘Cabinet papers 2003: Iraq war discussions remain secret amid John Howard-era document release’, The West Australian, 1 January 2024.↩
  2. Troy Bramston, ‘Cabinet papers debacle either ‘cover-up or pure farce’, The Australian, Sydney, 2 January 2024, 9. ↩
  3. Editorial, ‘Secret Papers must be made public’, The Australian, Sydney, 2 January 2024, 8.↩