The Moves team for the Archives Relocation Programme (ARP) is responsible for moving some items from the Parliamentary Archives collections offsite to a secure storage facility and the remainder of the collection to its new home at The National Archives in Kew. This blog will describe the processes and people involved in what has been a huge undertaking to help ensure that the Parliamentary Archives collections are protected and accessible for future generations.
Projects and teams
Two successful enabling projects, run under ARP and in partnership with the Parliamentary Archives, have completed their objectives on time. The first, Pack and Track (PAT), began in 2018 and was responsible for commencing the preparation work for future moves of Archive collections. PAT closed in September 2020, paving the way for the Prepare and Move (PAM) project to begin. PAM continued the critical and essential packing and cataloguing work that PAT started, as well as ownership review and disposal work. PAM also began moving items into offsite storage and, upon successful completion of its remit, closed in March 2024.
PAT and PAM were responsible for preparing Archive collections for their safe and secure move. They successfully completed the packing of 31,554 Modern Acts and 32,000 Original Rolled Acts. The teams either made bespoke packaging for or used ready-made packaging for 22,165 items from various other collections. They also catalogued 1,359 boxes (from recent Parliamentary Archives acquisitions up to 2018) and barcoded over 100,000 containers. Both projects have completed 100 percent of the offsite moves and 100 percent of the audit of 28,543 rolled plans – no mean feat at all!
The moves to The National Archives have been undertaken by the Moves workstream that started in earnest in April 2023. Any remaining preparatory work to support the moves, as well as additional critical work for Archive collections identified during PAM, have now transferred to, and will be completed by the Parliamentary Archives Preservation & Access Team.
The moves process
So, what does moving the iconic Parliamentary Archives collection entail? Well, the first part of the process involves getting all parties involved to agree move dates and that means liaising with ‘The Lady Usher of The Black Rod’ (more commonly known as ‘Black Rod’).
As Black Rod controls access to the House of Lords, building a good relationship with her office before any moves took place was something that Senior Project Manager Nelly Chalil worked hard to establish. Black Rod’s priority is to maintain order across the House and understandably the level of disruption we were potentially going to create was a slight worry early on in our planning.
Next on the list was to coordinate with our colleagues in the Parliamentary Public Services and Outreach (PS&O) team to ensure we weren’t moving items needed for continued research or exhibitions. Even though we’ve been slowly emptying the Archive shelves over the past few years, PS&O provided excellent business as usual search room services throughout and continued to provide a scaled down service until the search room closed at the end of June 2024.
To physically move the collection items, we used external contractors, who also provided vehicles and drivers. Coordinating their security clearance and access permissions were important first steps in ensuring they were able to follow our security procedures correctly.
Before preparing each collection, we carried out a walkthrough with colleagues from the Collection Care and Cataloguing teams to flag any issues that would prevent items from being moved safely. Issues included inaccurate catalogue references, unsuitable storage, or concerns with the condition of the items themselves. Some of these problems could be remedied relatively quickly, such as barcode replacement, but others took more time, resources and expertise from various colleagues, which is why we started this process as early as possible.
Moves day challenges
The Project Moves Lead and the two Moves Supervisors ensured everything ran smoothly on moves days. They were responsible for any contractors brought onsite, and as there were often tours, school trips, state visits and parliamentary events happening at the same time, it was important to always keep track of everyone. We’ve often turned our backs momentarily, only to realise that a van driver has been engulfed by an overly enthusiastic group of school children on an education tour!
There’s a strict security protocol for contractors and their vehicles entering the estate, so bookings have to be made, and offices alerted, to our activities in advance. We’re responsible for ensuring our contractors adhere to pass policies so this leaves little room for flexibility on the day.
Protecting the architectural fabric of the building (as it forms part of Parliament’s Heritage Collection) is a priority, especially when it comes to the large vehicles transporting items off the estate. Thanks go to all our drivers who had to manoeuvre their large vehicles around some tight spaces, and whose 3-point turns often had to morph into 300-point turns.
Regarding other challenges, we’ve also had to adjust our schedule (often last minute) to avoid sitting days and State visits, which can also result in a move being cancelled. The Victoria Tower itself presents even more challenges and consists of twelve floors of storerooms and a central open staircase which runs to the fifth floor with repositories leading off it. The remaining floors are accessed from a different staircase and a small, temperamental lift, which is how collection items travel within the archives.
As the Tower has no additional, suitable spaces available to prepare items or act as a ‘holding bay’ we oversee everything being removed from its shelf, transported down the tower, through the offices and out into the vehicle on move days. This must be done physically by hand or by using small trollies in the absence of sufficient space to use lifting equipment. We don’t leave any collection items or contractors unattended at any point so move days can often require a lot of support from Archives colleagues, so thanks go out to every single colleague who’s stepped in to help so far.
Our Moves Supervisors, Irina and Tom (seen in the images above), do most of the contractor supervision in the Tower, as well as manage all the associated documentation. We’re only granted a limited time onsite with our contractors so they’re responsible for ensuring everything runs as efficiently as possible.
There have also been challenges in terms of the collection itself, and these have particularly impacted conservation and cataloguing colleagues, much more so than the Moves team. Without their input and expertise, the moves could not go ahead, so their invaluable input highlights the importance of a collaborative effort across Archives teams.
The PA collection consists of mixed materials, including leather, parchment, paper, photographs, vellum and wax seals and often need a different approach to their care, packing and transport. Similarly, environmental considerations need to be factored in, especially for the audio-visual collection.
Some items have been too fragile to move without considerable consultation and help from Parliamentary Archives Collection Care colleagues, who are currently undertaking a separate project to stabilise and re-house a collection of Royal Commissions which feature fragile wax seals. Check out the team’s blog on wax seals here: https://archives.blog.parliament.uk/2024/07/05/protecting-history-rehousing-fragile-pendant-wax-seals-for-collections-move-and-long-term-preservation/
Moves team members who have worked on other collections management projects in other institutions advise that they’ve never had to consider whether moves take priority over resident nesting falcons! These issues can be testing at times, but Archives colleagues have been invaluable in helping the team navigate the particular ‘quirks’ of the estate.
Reaching our destination
The images above show part of our rolled act collection at The National Archives. The PA Conservation team carried out the initial survey and oversaw the cleaning and boxing of these items in bespoke, handmade boxes. The PA Cataloguing team ensured each item was sufficiently catalogued and barcoded so that they could be tracked during the move. Once the collection reached its destination, we supervised the unloading of items and recorded relevant move data, such as location change.
Seeing items in the collection move into offsite storage and The National Archives has been a really rewarding experience and is the result of years of collaboration and hard work from so many colleagues, contractors, volunteers, and staff at our offsite storage facility and The National Archives. A huge thanks goes to everyone involved.
If you’d like to know more about the programme and why the move is happening, please visit the ARP webpage on the UK Parliament website.
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