I'm happy to respond to that question.
If you're asking what were the previous rules, Library and Archives Canada and its predecessor agencies go back to 1872, so we've been collecting government records since that time, and a variety of different regimes have governed that. But essentially we have been responsible for the disposition of records, which can include one of three outcomes: the records come to Library and Archives Canada for permanent storage; they're transferred outside of the Government of Canada's control, so they may be transferred to another entity entirely; or they're destroyed.
We govern that disposition through what we call records disposition authorities. These are agreements that are signed between Library and Archives Canada and each organization that is subject to our act. That identifies the records that need to be maintained and those that can be destroyed. Some records need to be maintained for a much longer period of time as business records of the active department, never mind their historical value as archival records when they come to us. So each of those records and disposition authorities is specific to the institution that governs it. Until such a records disposition authority is in place, departments are not authorized to destroy records.
There are also specific provisions in other legislation, such as the Access to Information Act, that deal with particular situations, but generally with respect to the ongoing management of government records, it's our legislation and the tool we use is the records disposition authorities.