Page 657 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 11 February 2009
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FOI reform should be in the form of the removal of conclusive certificates and the rest, the bulk of the legislation, should be referred for thorough investigation and inquiry. That is the consistent approach that we have taken since the election and that is the approach that we will take with this amendment.
My bill puts into effect the Liberal Party’s legislative program, and I have foreshadowed the terms of reference for an inquiry. While we are in the process of reviewing the effectiveness and the operations of the Freedom of Information Act, Mr Corbell wants to slip in a new class of documents which, for the past 20 years of the operation of freedom of information in the ACT, has not been considered necessary. For 20 years the Freedom of Information Act has operated in the ACT and it has not been considered necessary to exempt simpliciter, completely, without any contemplation as to the appropriateness of it—
Mr Corbell: That is because there have been conclusive certificates, Mrs Dunne.
MRS DUNNE: You can interrupt all you like. I will use my full 20 minutes to address the issue.
Mr Corbell: I am not worried about how much time you take, Mrs Dunne. The point is there have been conclusive certificates.
MRS DUNNE: Madam Assistant Speaker, if Mr Corbell wants to run a critique of my comments, he is free to take his extra 10 minutes, actually his unlimited time, his extra 10 minutes and do that.
The point that the opposition makes is that it is not appropriate at a time when we are embarking upon reform to create a class of documents that is not even subject to the act. By virtue of it having on the front of it “cabinet notebook” we cannot even consider the contents. Mr Corbell tries to paint a picture. He does not say it directly, but he paints a picture that he and his colleagues are going to go into cabinet and make a decision and, almost automatically, something that I have done or something that people in here will have done will require the publication of that cabinet notebook as a matter of course. He did not say it quite like that but that was the clear implication.
What has happened in the past is that people have been able to make requests under the Freedom of Information Act for certain classes of documents. It may be that from time to time a page or two pages of the cabinet notebook may come within the ambit of an FOI request. Then a decision maker has to make a decision about whether or not it should be released, and that decision has to be made in the public interest.
Mr Corbell’s proposed amendment would prevent a decision maker from making a decision, exercising his professional judgment about the public interest. It would prevent a tribunal or a court from exercising their professional and learned judgment about the public interest by saying, “You cannot even think about it. Simon says.” That is the difference in our approach. That is why we, at this stage, are not prepared to go down that path of exempting the cabinet notebook.
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