Instead, it was due to administrative errors, poor internal systems and a filing cabinet no one was able to open.
Thirteen of those were related to the Iraq War and the Howard government’s decision to join the US-led “coalition of the willing” and send Australian troops into the conflict that was later labelled illegal by the UN secretary-general of the time, Kofi Annan.
The invasion was largely justified using the US’s assertion that Iraq held weapons of mass destruction, although none were ever found.
While there were suggestions the missing cabinet documents were the result of a cover-up, an investigation by former defence head and US ambassador Dennis Richardson found there was nothing nefarious at play.
“The incomplete transfer of 2003 cabinet records to the NAA in 2020 was an administrative error, caused, in part, by the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, but also by internal systemic issues,” a statement from the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet (PM&C) today said.
One of those internal issues was a group of cabinets that no one had access to in a room where four extra cabinet records – one of which related to the Iraq War – were discovered.
“The four additional cabinet records were located in a sealed envelope, inside a class C container, within a special security room inside a restricted area of PM&C,” Richardson’s report states.
“The review was reliant on appropriately security cleared staff to access the physical location, none of which were immediately present.
“Following access, the room itself contained several cabinets which no one person within cabinet division had access.
“The material within the room holding cabinet records was poorly itemised, tailor-made for a mistake in a future transfer process from PM&C to the NAA.”
All 82 papers have now been sent to the National Archives, while Richardson made five recommendations to ensure another error in making cabinet records public isn’t repeated.
Those recommendations include a thorough review of PM&C’s record management processes, and that national security committee records be considered for public release in the same way cabinet papers currently are.
The PM&C said it had already begun implementing the recommendations.
