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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1)
2018-10-24 Daily Xml
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Freedom of Information (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Ms BEDFORD (Florey) (10:37): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

This bill has come from the other place, and I am introducing it on behalf of the Hon. Mark Parnell MLC of the Australian Greens. It passed through that chamber last week. The origins of this bill are in a report delivered by the former ombudsman back in 2014 following a review of how various government agencies handled their responsibilities under the Freedom of Information Act.

The current bill is a trimmed-down version of bills that were debated in the upper house back in 2014 and 2016. There are three provisions in the bill, all of which have been identified by the current Ombudsman as worthy of support now, notwithstanding that the Attorney-General has indicated that the whole Freedom of Information Act will be reviewed. The provisions are:

1. Setting out factors that should be taken into account in determining whether or not the release of documents to an applicant is in the public interest;

2. Clarifying that a claim by an agency that documents cannot be found or do not exist is still a determination and, therefore, subject to internal or external review; and

3. Making it an offence to improperly interfere politically in a determination.

Each of these three areas was identified by the Ombudsman as worthy of support now while we await the rewrite of the entire act. They are all derived from recommendations of the current and former ombudsmen and should be regarded as low-hanging fruit or no-regret reforms that would almost certainly be included in the holistic review of the act which the Attorney-General has committed to undertake but which is unlikely to reach parliament until sometime next year. I therefore commend the bill to the house.

Mr PEDERICK: I move:

That the debate be adjourned.

Ayes 22

Noes 19

Majority 3

AYES
Basham, D.K.B. Chapman, V.A. Cowdrey, M.J.
Cregan, D. Ellis, F.J. Gardner, J.A.W.
Harvey, R.M. (teller) Knoll, S.K. Luethen, P.
McBride, N. Murray, S. Patterson, S.J.R.
Pederick, A.S. Pisoni, D.G. Power, C.
Sanderson, R. Speirs, D.J. Teague, J.B.
Treloar, P.A. van Holst Pellekaan, D.C. Whetstone, T.J.
Wingard, C.L.
NOES
Bedford, F.E. (teller) Bell, T.S. Bettison, Z.L.
Bignell, L.W.K. Boyer, B.I. Brock, G.G.
Brown, M.E. Close, S.E. Cook, N.F.
Gee, J.P. Hildyard, K.A. Hughes, E.J.
Koutsantonis, A. Mullighan, S.C. Odenwalder, L.K.
Piccolo, A. Picton, C.J. Stinson, J.M.
Wortley, D.
PAIRS
Duluk, S. Rau, J.R. Marshall, S.S.
Malinauskas, P.
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