State librarians from New South Wales, Western Australia, South Australia, Tasmania, Queensland and Victoria first met as the State Librarians Council in March 1973, with the aim of forming a peak body to represent and lobby for their organisations in dealings with the Commonwealth Government.
During this time, many projects were developed, such as the Distributed National Collection agreement and the AskNow online virtual reference service.
[1] At the November 2017 meeting, NSLA developed a new strategic plan and business model, deciding to focus on Australian constituents and stakeholders, and from 2018 the name became National and State Libraries Australia.
[3] One of NSLA's ongoing projects is collecting, collating and making accessible a range of statistics pertaining to public library services in Australia, which are available on its website dating back to 1996.
[4] The organisation has been involved in a number of projects funded by the Australian Research Council (ARC), such as Climate History Australia and Grey Literature Strategies.
NSLA member libraries "acknowledge their collective, individual and moral responsibilities to ensure that management and access to these collection materials is culturally informed and respectful [which] includes recognition and protection of the ongoing, communal nature of Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property (ICIP) rights".