Victorian government’s Covid lockdown briefing documents set to be released

Secret briefings used to justify sending Victorians into the world’s longest lockdown are set to be released, despite the Department of Health fighting to keep them hidden from the public.

Former premier Daniel Andrews oversaw the world’s longest lockdown in Victoria. Picture: Aaron Francis

Secret briefings used to justify sending Victorians into the world’s longest lockdown are set to be released for the first time.

Despite the Department of Health fighting to keep the documents secret, claiming it would take years to prepare them for release, officials have been ordered to make them public.

In a landmark Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal decision handed down this week, vice president Judge Caitlin English ruled there was a high degree of public interest in the release of the material that underpinned dozens of pandemic orders.

It is estimated more than 100 briefs running up to 7000 pages could be released.

It follows an almost four-years long Freedom of Information fight by Liberal MP David Davis for access to all working documents, advice, and scientific assessments underpinning public health orders throughout the pandemic.

Former deputy secretary Jeroen Weimear argued the request would “divert critical resources away” from the health department. Picture: Penny Stephens

In their bid to keep the documents secret, officials including former deputy secretary Jeroen Weimar, argued the request would divert critical resources away from the department’s 3400 employees.

It would see delays in communications to the public regarding public health advice, public health policy development, government briefings, governance and risk management, timely reporting and people management and supervision, they argued.

They also argued the cost of processing the request would run into tens of thousands of dollars.

Mr Weimar estimated it would take between 169.4 to 208.4 working weeks — or more than four years — for staff to locate and process the documents that were the subject of the FOI request.

Judge Caitlin English ruled there was a high degree of public interest in the documents. Picture: Asanka Ratnayake.

However Judge English was not convinced, finding there was no evidence that any frontline services would be impacted, or their resources diverted if the FOI request was processed.

She said while the processing of the requests would “have a significant impact on the resources of the FOI unit”, the department had failed to discharge its onus of establishing that its estimate of the resources required for processing was reasonable, and that the work involved in processing the request would substantially and unreasonably divert the resources of the agency from its other operations, which would have allowed it to properly refuse to process the requests.

Mr Davis said Victorians were entitled to understand the full details behind every one of the pandemic rules.

“Victorians were locked down for the longest period in the world, had the highest death rate in Australia and suffered the most economic damage of anywhere in Australia,” he said.

“Consequently, they have a right to see this information upon which key Covid decisions were based.

“Labor have spent almost four years fighting the release of this basic information Victorians have a right to see.

“How can you lock down a community for so long and restrict their freedoms without having an absolute duty to be transparent and open about the reasons?

“We owe it to those who died, to those who suffered, and to the children who were robbed of their childhood to understand the reasons, and to learn the lessons, so they are never repeated.”

The department will have until the end of June to decide whether it will appeal the decision.