International Law

Greater transparency for hospital performance but don't mention "league tables"

Posted on January 31, 2008
You would be justified in reading into the headlines today that no one is quite sure what was agreed or not agreed at yesterday's health ministers meeting about data on comparative performance on hospitals - "Health deal undermined" (AFR); "Ministers avoid talk of hospital scorecards" (SMH); "Roxon to push for hospital scorecards" (The Age) etc...

Missed opportunity to illustrate the new era of openness

Posted on January 30, 2008
Following the release last Friday of the six monthly report (to July 2007) on travel by members and former members of Federal Parliament, depending on which paper you read, you may have seen that Prime Minister (then Opposition Leader) Rudd topped the list with $300,000 in travel and expenses; that then Defence Minister (now Opposition Leader) Brendan Nelson spent $74,000 on a trip to the United States; and various other tidbits about former members with that gold pass for life that entitles them to 25 domestic air travel tickets per year...

Queensland review Discussion Paper released

Posted on January 30, 2008
The Discussion Paper "Enhancing Open and Accountable Government" released today by the Solomon Review, has the intended purpose "to raise the major issues that will be considered by the Panel appointed by the Queensland Government to recommend ways to improve and modernise the Queensland Freedom of Information Act 1992"...

Those affected should be informed about major data security breaches

Posted on January 30, 2008
Yes, the Federal Privacy Commissioner is right in calling for compulsory notification of major data security breaches. It's clear that we are pretty much in the dark here concerning possible breaches that may have significant identity fraud implications...

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Freedom of Information and Brian Burke meet up again

Posted on January 28, 2008
The Crime and Conduct Commission in Western Australia released a report (see under publications) last Friday on alleged misconduct by the Director General of the Department of Health, Dr. Fong (who resigned when the report was released) arising from his claims that he had no relationship with former Premier Brian Burke...

Australia Day gong for privacy and FOI work

Posted on January 27, 2008
I don't know Joan Savic of the ACT, but congratulations on her Public Service Medal in the Australia Day honours for "promoting best practice in privacy and Freedom of Information in Centrelink and throughout the pubic service".

NSW ADT President highlights problems with repeat applicants

Posted on January 27, 2008
In commenting on the year in review in the latest annual report of the NSW Administrative Decisions Tribunal President Kevin O'Connor highlights the "increasingly difficult management problem for tribunals" of the repeat litigant."The "querulent" litigant may have suffered a real injustice...

Data loss one of the big privacy issues of 2007

Posted on January 27, 2008
The latest unhappy UK experience of data loss involved the theft of a laptop containing details of 600,000 people who have expressed an interest in or have joined the navy, marines and air force. For those who had submitted written applications, "extensive personal data" was involved including the bank details of 3,500 people...

Concern about personal information misuse tops poll

Posted on January 27, 2008
Unisys has been conducting a regular survey of public perceptions towards security since June 2006. The December 2007 results show a moderate change since August last year, with the largest changes occurring in the number of people extremely or very concerned about a serious health epidemic and their ability to meet essential financial obligations (and this before the darker days of January)...

NSW Tribunal limits criteria for public interest disclosure

Posted on January 27, 2008
Another aspect of the NSW Administrative Decisions Tribunal decision in Waite v Hornsby Shire Council (2007) NSWADT 265 worth a comment is the way in which Judicial Member Higgins gave consideration to exercise of the discretion to require disclosure of an otherwise exempt document on public interest grounds...

FOI applicants: agencies should 'know' what they mean!

Posted on January 21, 2008
A couple of important points for agencies from two NSW Administrative Decisions Tribunal Freedom of Information cases - interpret the application in a commonsense rather than literal manner, and make all reasonable inquiries in trying to locate relevant documents, including your solicitors when appropriate...

Lessons for Australia from UK Information Commissioner experience

Posted on January 21, 2008
Federal Labor, in opposition, announced its intention (among other Freedom of Information reforms) to establish an Information Commissioner with powers to undertake review of FOI determinations, to replace review by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal...

WA public service work and wage assessments not so secret after all

Posted on January 21, 2008
An important decision (PDF) in Western Australia in December by a specially appointed Acting Information Commissioner, Christopher Shanahan S.C, resulted in a comprehensive victory (after 20 months of trying) for the Civil Service Association and West Australian Newspapers Ltd...

Discussion of US FOI changes

Posted on January 17, 2008
For those with an interest in the fine detail of the recent US Freedom of Information Amendments, Rick Snell of the University of Tasmania has alerted me to the three podcasts available from the Washington College of Law of panel sessions held on 16 January.

Unfair limits on external review

Posted on January 17, 2008
Updated (21/1) with a couple of additional thoughts that hopefully make the point clearer.The various Australian Freedom of Information acts provide that if an application is not dealt with within the statutory time limit, this constitutes a 'deemed refusal' of access to the requested documents, and gives rise to rights to seek review...

Cult members and former PM's cosy correspondence revealed

Posted on January 17, 2008
Anyone's entitled to write to the Prime Minister or any other minister, and to enjoy some degree of confidentiality regarding sensitive personal or commercial information.But those who seek to influence government decision making shouldn't have the same expectation...

Australia flunks privacy exam

Posted on January 14, 2008
This isn't a map where colours indicate the old British Empire. But red and black indicate those countries with exceedingly poor form when it comes to privacy protection.Privacy International and the Electronic Privacy Information Center have released results of their 2007 survey of the state of privacy protection in EU countries and a number of others including Australia...

Progress on a couple of fronts

Posted on January 13, 2008
Two other "good news" tidbits.The Victorian Government has released documents about major projects, found to be not exempt by the Court of Appeal, rather than seeking to take the matter further. The Court of Appeal decision is a valuable precedent on what constitutes a cabinet document...

FOI in the news

Posted on January 13, 2008
Regular readers will know that we don't usually highlight every media report based on documents released in response to a freedom of information application. One of the reasons is there are just too many reports of this kind.A look at the papers over the last few days for example, is a reminder that a lot of information finds its way into the public domain through the use of freedom of information laws...

Big stick approach to making FOI work

Posted on January 13, 2008
It's well established that more than a reasonable 'access to information' law is necessary to make Freedom of Information work in practice. A whole range of other issues concerning culture, processing requests, costs, and rights of review also need to be addressed...

Victorian ministerial travel 'found' in cyberspace

Posted on January 09, 2008
With reference to our item on 2 January about the publication of ministerial travel expenses in Victoria, a reader (in Queensland - thanks) managed to track down the hard to find details. . They are located here.The Department's home page doesn't exactly lead you straight there...

Senator Faulkner beefs up 'FOI expertise'

Posted on January 08, 2008
Some good news. In reporting on appointments to ministers' offices in Canberra, The Australian Financial Review yesterday said Kate Harrison had been appointed Chief of Staff to Special Minister of State, Senator John Faulkner. Harrison is a partner with the law firm Gilbert+Tobin...

FOI disclosure not necessarily disclosure to 'world at large'

Posted on January 08, 2008
There were a few important Freedom of Information decisions around the country over the last month or so (will try to catch up soon) but a decision by Justice Hansen in the Victorian Supreme Court has overturned in that state at least, a time honoured concept that a decision about disclosure of documents in response to an FOI application should be dealt with on the basis that disclosure, in effect releases documents into the public domain and should be considered disclosure to the 'world at large'...

NSW Privacy Commissioner has big task ahead

Posted on January 08, 2008
The NSW Government has finally made a permanent appointment of a Privacy Commissioner, after four years of short term acting appointments. Judge Ken Taylor, formerly of the District Court who also had a couple of years as Acting Head of The Health Care Complaints Commission, was appointed in December for a five year term...

Big Brother getting bigger

Posted on January 06, 2008
But one thing we aren't much concerned about apparently is how technology now has the potential to expose large elements of our private lives to scrutiny. This article in today's Sydney Morning Herald uses some examples in the Australian Law Reform Commission Issues Discussion Paper on Privacy about RFID and CCTV...

Lots of voices out there for making democracy work better

Posted on January 06, 2008
GetUp! the citizen activist group that had quite a bit of impact during the federal election, followed this up with a series of over 320 "GetTogethers" in December during which participants were invited to talk about the most pressing priorities for the next parliament...

South Australian Government backward in coming forward

Posted on January 04, 2008
Summer holiday blogI'm not sure whether this is a record or how it compares with other jurisdictions, but The Advertiser reports that in South Australia over 1000 questions on notice in the Parliament remain unanswered. The government says responses to Freedom of Information applications and annual reports contain most of the answers...

(Relatively) positive start for US FOI in 2008

Posted on January 04, 2008
Summer holiday blogPresident Bush this week signed the OPEN Government Act, the first significant freedom of information reforms in the US for years. While the reforms have been welcomed by the media and others, many (including me) got it wrong in suggesting that the final version contained a provision that required disclosure unless harm would result...

Ministers travel information in cyberspace somewhere?

Posted on January 01, 2008
Summer holiday blogThis article in the Herald Sun prompted me to think that the Victorian Government should also get a tick for delivering on its commitment to publish on the web details of ministerial travel expenses quarterly.But I'll withhold praise for the time being as I've been completely unsuccessful in trying to find these details on the website mentioned in the article, the Department of Innovation, Industry and Regional Development...

NSW: "Secrets State"

Posted on December 30, 2007
Summer holiday blogThe Sydney Morning Herald has again labeled NSW "The Secrets State", giving a bit of summertime coverage to matters raised in the NSW Ombudsman Report released some months ago. Its all pretty true.However given a separate report detailing how the NSW Police were unenthusiastic about the purchase of a water cannon to keep ruly citizens under control, it should be acknowledged that the one document relevant to a decision by its political masters to spend $750,000 was released in response to a Freedom of Information application - eventually...

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