Page 261 - Week 01 - Thursday, 24 February 1994
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to any form of personal information to the person requesting it, up to 20 hours of search time - as it is $20 an hour for search time, that is a saving of up to $400 on search time - as well as 200 pages of free photocopying. Beyond 200 pages people will pay 10c a page. That means that the ordinary citizen who wants to know what the Government has relating to them will have free access.
There has been a provision that allows us to waive fees in individual cases; but the person, in effect, has to come cap in hand to the Government and say, "I need my fees waived". We think that is inappropriate. We are prepared to say that the individual does have a right to find out the information that the Government holds on them. The Opposition, of course, says, "No, no; we should have the right to find out what is going on in your Cabinet room". That is not what freedom of information is about. Freedom of information is about the public having access to information about themselves.
I did give some undertakings at the Estimates Committee last year, when I was pressed about turnaround times in FOI, that we would seek to have some improvements. I am pleased to report that in the first six months of the current financial year - that is, from July 1993 to the end of December 1993 - compared to the equivalent period in the previous financial year, we dealt with 88 per cent of requests in under 45 days compared to 64 per cent of requests in under 45 days. That is a significant improvement in the fast requests. Most significantly, only 4.1 per cent of requests have taken longer than 60 days to process, whereas in the equivalent period in 1992 some 20 per cent of requests were taking more than 60 days. Given that many of these requests, particularly the ones that are taking a long time, are the complex "We want to fiddle around in the Cabinet room documents" requests from politicians and journalists, this indicates that we are processing matters more rapidly, which was exactly what I gave an undertaking to the Estimates Committee that we would do.
ACTION - Industrial Dispute
MR DE DOMENICO: Madam Speaker, my question without notice is to the Minister for Urban Services. The Minister is to be congratulated and - - -
MADAM SPEAKER: Would you be seated, Mr Stevenson.
Mr Stevenson: I thought that if I stood up I would be in early for the next one.
MADAM SPEAKER: You may have just missed your opportunity.
Mr Stevenson: "Vengeance is mine", sayeth the Speaker.
MADAM SPEAKER: Order!
Mr Stevenson: I think there should be.
Mr Berry: This is a bit over the top.
Mr Stevenson: I agree.
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