Headline

Month Date, 2006: The director of the Victorian Office of Multicultural Affairs, Barbara Mountjouris, is accused of hiding documents relating to a freedom of information request. Political infighting ensues.

The Australian media is reporting that the Barbara Mountjouris is being accused of hiding documents relating to a Freedom Of Information request from Victorian State Opposition member, Nick Kotsiras. Kotsiras has further claimed that, "She allegedly did this to avoid any embarrassment for this government."

Aside from throwing up standard political in-fighting in the lead-up to a November State election round, the issue raises questions relating to just how documents can be classified in FOI requests.

According the Victorian Attorney General, Rob Hulls, a decision to exclude two documents regarding an independent consultant to the VOMA, from the list delivered to Kotsiris, should stand. The reason for this, according to Hulls, is that, "The document did not fall within the scope of the FoI. That decision was made by an independent FOI officer."

In January this year, Victorian state member, Nick Kotsiras, made what looked like a straightforward Freedom Of Information request regarding third parties doing business with the Office of Multicultural Affairs. 45 days later, the documents had still not appeared, so Kotsiras went to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal for redress.

During this process, Kotsiras was sent two documents that did not find their way to the final list of eight provided in a list by the government. The two errant documents comprised a speech written for John Pandazopoulos, the Labor Member for Dandenong. An invoice for $2,064 also accompanied the speech written by Dennis Glover. Glover is not one of the team of speechwriters on Pandazopoulos staff.

Kotsiras, first took up cudgels regarding the speech itself, saying, "How can anyone justify $2,000 for a speech when they have at least 18 people working for them to do that?" It is the FOI request itself which is becoming the nub of the matter.

The issue regards just which documents are allowable under the many caveats regarding public interest in Australia's Freedom Of Information legislation. And, as importantly, who exactly defines these.

This time around, for example, the Victorian Attorney General is taking very different line of argument from the one he took on the ABC's Stateline program on the 25th of July 2003. During the program, Professor Rick Snell from University Of Tasmania, made the following comment:
"The guidelines still say that it's up to the FOI officer to make the final decision but in reality if a ministerial advisor for the Attorney-General or for the Premier is giving strong indications that they would prefer this information not to be released, that Mr Bracks would be uncomfortable about the release of information, then any junior government officer who is dealing with FOI requests is going to take that into account in their decision-making process."

The Attorney General, having already stated that, "When you're talking about taxpayers money, the public have a right to know how that money is being used," answered Snell's criticism as follows: "I've actually met with the Ombudsman in relation to this very matter because there were some concerns as to what the lines were in relation to speaking with ministerial advisers and the like. And we'd sent out some protocols in relation to that based on the Ombudsman."

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