The home affairs department is failing to meet lawful deadlines in a huge proportion of freedom of information cases, a problem exacerbated by the involvement of ministerial staff, poor training and the need for greater senior-level departmental support, an investigation has found.
The freedom of information system is a critical plank of transparency and accountability in Australia, but data shows it is currently deteriorating considerably, with delays, complaints and refusals all on the rise.
The department of home affairs is by far the biggest recipient of FOI requests but frequently struggles to meet its obligations to process requests within lawful timeframes.
In October 2019, after receiving a series of complaints about home affairs, the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner started an own-motion investigation of the department’s FOI handling.
The report released on Friday found the department missed the lawful deadline in more than half of the FOI requests for non-personal information it received each year for the past four years.
It found there were “inadequate processes” for escalating requests and finalising decisions, and the department was using non-FOI staff with inadequate training to work on some requests.
“The department has implemented an approach for processing FOI requests for non-personal information that requires significant engagement by the staff in the business areas to which a relevant FOI request relates,” the report found. “The training and resources made available to those staff does not facilitate processing FOI requests within the FOI Act statutory processing periods.”
The department also lacked “senior-level support for embedding policies, procedures and systems for compliance”, the investigation found.
The involvement of media teams and the minister’s office in FOI requests also “limits the ability of the department to meet” its deadlines.
The OAIC recommended the department immediately appoint an “information champion” to make sure the department is complying with the FOI act. It should also prepare an operational manual to instruct staff on how to process FOI requests within the lawful timeframes, train its staff in FOI, and conduct a broader audit of its performance.
The department said it accepted all recommendations and has had a program of continuous improvement under way since October 2019 to improve its performance.
“As a result of the continuous improvement program, the department more than doubled the finalisation of requests for non-personal information in 2019-20 compared to 2018-19 (1,789 compared to 870),” a spokesman said.
It’s not the first time the department has come under fire for its FOI handling.
In 2019, the Guardian revealed that its delayed handling of FOI requests had led to almost 8,000 requests being automatically refused.
It has also been accused by a whistleblower of breaking freedom of information law to withhold documents about alleged legal breaches during pay negotiations with staff.
When the independent senator Rex Patrick asked about the department’s compliance at Senate estimates in October 2019, the home affairs secretary, Michael Pezzullo, said he was attempting to “spread finite resources across every single piece of legislation this parliament sees fit to pass”.
“It’s within it’s your prerogative to pass laws as you see fit,” he said. “Like my colleagues in the portfolio and more generally across government, I have to apply finite resources, which allow us to comply to the maximum extent we can.”
Patrick said the report had “properly rapped Mr Pezzullo over the knuckles”.
“As the principal officer for home affairs responsible for FOI, his performance does not meet the expectations and professional responsibilities for the chief executive of a federal government department,” Patrick said.
“But I live in hope and will be following it up at March’s estimates committee hearings.”
