Your Right to Know: Home Affairs under investigation over Freedom of Information failures

Australia’s national security and law enforcement department is under investigation after repeatedly failing to meet Freedom of Information deadlines.

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The Department of Home Affairs is facing an investigation for failing to respond to hundreds of Freedom of Information requests within the required time frame.

The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner launched the investigation on Friday, a week after publishing its annual report into privacy and Freedom of Information reviews and complaints.

In a statement, the OAIC said Home Affairs received 734 FOI requests for non-personal information during the last financial year but more than half of those submissions — 56 per cent — were not processed within 30 days as required by law.

The agency also said it had received “a number of FOI complaints and review applications” about the Department’s delays in processing requests.

The Home Affairs investigation follows a week of intense public scrutiny of the Morrison Government over an increasing “culture of secrecy” in its ranks as part of the Your Right to Know campaign, and after a number of newspapers turned their front pages black to highlight the issue.

The media coalition, which includes News Corp, the ABC, Nine, SBS, The Guardian, and the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance, is asking for six reforms to ensure the public is kept informed about government actions, including changes to Freedom of Information laws to reduce delays, obstacles, costs, and wide-ranging exceptions.

The OAIC’s annual report showed the Department of Home Affairs received the greatest number of FOI requests last year, at 17,725, but the number of requests submitted for non-personal information fell by 44 per cent.

The Department of Home Affairs also refused the greatest number of requests by a large margin, according to the report, denying 908 requests or more than five per cent.

A further 5,375 FOI requests to Home Affairs were only partially granted.

Commissioner Angelene Falk said this year’s FOI figures proved “organisations must act” to ensure they met expectations of an open, accessible government.

“The trends we are seeing reinforce the importance of our mission: to increase public trust and confidence in the protection of personal information and access to government-held information,” she said.

A spokesperson for the Department of Home Affairs said it sought to process all FOI requests within the 30-day time limit, and had improved processing rates since June even though they still fell short of the target.

“This financial year to date the Department has finalised 444 non-personal requests with a compliance rate of 62.5 per cent,” the spokesperson said.

“The Department is continuing to improve its compliance with the statutory time frames contained in the FOI Act.”

Originally published as Your Right to Know: Home Affairs under investigation over Freedom of Information failures