The Office Of The Victorian Information Commissioner (Ovic) has found Hume City Council wanting when it comes to processing Freedom of Information (FOI) requests.
Ovic is responsible for regulating the FOI Act and has oversight of the Victorian government’s collection, use, and disclosure of information – that includes regional councils.
In Ovic’s latest annual report – covering the 12 months to June 2024 – there are numerous entries for Hume Council.
All up, of the 18 complaints made to Ovic about the council’s handling of FOI requests:
- 12 were resolved (Ovic helped the council understand its obligations)
- 5 were taken no further
- 1 was upheld
The complaint that was upheld was due to council taking 167 days to respond to an FOI. It should have responded within 21 days if the request was deemed not valid, or 30 days if it was. Still, 18 complaints about the council in 12 months…That’s some going.
Hume Council’s CEO Sheena Frost must be disappointed to see her organisation placed fourth in a list of government organisations with the highest number of complaints. In fact, Hume is the only regional council in the top 20 (see page 95).
In the 2023-24 year, the council received 148 FOIs. It means that of all the requests for information made to council, someone said ‘not good enough’ 148 times and went to the trouble of putting in a freedom of information request. That’s almost three FOIs every week.
Of those 148, the applicants of 18 of them felt shortchanged and went the next step to make a formal complaint to Ovic.
Making an FOI request isn’t free. Each one costs the applicant $32.70. Although council has the discretion to waive these fees.
In addition to the application fee, council can charge search fees if research to locate the requested information costs council more than $100 in staff time.
Open, transparent, and answerable to the people? Perhaps someone at council should read its public transparency policy. Particularly as I hear there are FOIs that have not been touched in more than a year. Perhaps an FOI is needed to find out why…
