Contact:
Janelle Skipworth
Telephone No:
(03) 5153 9500
Corporate Centre
Email:
xxx@xxxxxx.xxx.xxx.xx
273 Main Street (PO Box 1618)
Our reference:
FOI477
Bairnsdale Victoria 3875
Telephone: (03) 5153 9500
2 September 2024
National Relay Service: 133 677
Residents’ Info Line: 1300 555 886
Facsimile: (03) 5153 9576
Email: xxxxxxxx@xxxxxx.xxx.xxx.xx
Ms Patsy Lisle
ABN 81 957 967 765
Via email only:
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxx.xxx.xx
Dear Ms Lisle
Notice of decision – request for documents under the Freedom of Information Act 1982
(Vic)
We refer to your request to East Gippsland Shire Council (“
Council”), which you clarified via
email on 2 July 2024, for access to documents under the
Freedom of Information Act 1982 (Vic)
(“
FOI Act”) for access to:
“Documents about the Bastion Point ocean access facility received from consultants
investigating problems with the facility and/or providing proposed solutions dating from the
facility's opening in December 2014 until now. That includes the dilapidation report
provided by Magryn and Associates in 2023.”
(“
Request”)
I also refer to your emails dated 12 July 2024 and 13 July 2024 where you advised that you seek
draft versions of documents but do not seek access to the following:
• duplicate documents;
• commercial information of third parties; and
• any type of personal affairs information of third parties (including the types of personal
affairs information that are defined by section 33(9) of the FOI Act.
You have also advised that you are content to receive documents with exempt or irrelevant
material removed. That is, you are content to receive documents with any information that is
exempt under the FOI Act removed, along with any information that is irrelevant to your Request
(such as the personal affairs information and commercial information of third parties).
Preliminary matters
I am authorised under section 26 of the FOI Act to make decisions on behalf of Council in relation
to freedom of information requests.
After conducting a thorough and diligent search, the Council has identified 6 documents that fall
within the scope of your Request. Of these, one document titled “Wharf Structures Condition
Assessment Manual” is publicly available through Ports Australia - Wharf Structures Condition
Assessment Manual at
https:/ www.portsaustralia.com.au/wscam.
We have assumed that you would prefer to access this document outside the FOI Act, so that
access charges wil not apply. If this is incorrect, please let us know.
Website: www.eastgippsland.vic.gov.au Twitter: @egsc Email: xxxxxxxx@xxxxxx.xxx.xxx.xx
link to page 2 link to page 2
In making our decision on the remaining 5 documents, we have taken into account all relevant
considerations including; the terms of your Request and wil ingness to receive copies of
documents with exempt or irrelevant material removed, where practicable:
• the documents relevant to your Request, including their contents;
• information provided by Council’s officers in relation to the documents;
• my knowledge and understanding of the FOI Act;
• the fact that you do not seek access to commercial information relating to third parties or
personal information relating to third parties;
• the practicability of consulting with third parties to obtain their views on the disclosure of
information in the documents; and
• the outcomes of consultations with third parties where required under the FOI Act.
Decision and reasons
We have decided to grant you access in ful to 5 documents with all personal information and
commercial information of third parties removed as irrelevant.
Review rights of third parties
We note that in this instance a third party has the right to apply for a review of our decision to
release the information. We cannot release this information as the relevant business did not
specifically consent to the Council disclosing their business, commercial and financial information
during consultation under section 34(1)(b) of the FOI Act.
Under section 50(3A) of the FOI Act, that business now has the right to seek review of our
decision to disclose that information to you. Section 52(3) of the FOI Act provides that the
business has 60 days from receiving notice of my decision to disclose to make such a review
application to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (“
VCAT”). Until the expiry of that
review period, we are unable to provide you with access to the document.
If Council does not receive notification from the VCAT of an application for review of its decision
by the relevant business within the next 70 days, then we wil contact you to arrange a time for
you to inspect the document under supervision, provided that there are no outstanding access
charges remaining payable at that date.
Access charges
The FOI Act requires that access charges be paid before documents are provided pursuant to a
request for access. The access charges payable in respect of the documents being released in
response to the Request have been calculated by me in accordance with section 22 of the Act
and the
Freedom of Information (Access Charges) Regulations 2014 (“
Regulations”) as follows:
Search time x 1.5 hours @ $24.50 per hour or part thereof:
1
$36.75
Supervised inspection @ $6.12 per quarter hour
2 (18 pages)
$6.10
Total charges payable
$42.85
You wil be given access to the documents once the Council has received payment of the access
charges in full.
1 Item 1, Regulations, where the charge is 1.5 fee units per hour or part of an hour and a fee unit is
currently $16.33.
2 Item 2, Regulations, where the charge is 1.5 fee units per hour calculated per quarter hour or part of a
quarter hour. A fee unit is currently $16.33.
Website: www.eastgippsland.vic.gov.au Twitter: @egsc Email: xxxxxxxx@xxxxxx.xxx.xxx.xx
You can make the access charges payment by one of the following options:
•
In person at one of
Council's Service or Outreach Centres by credit card, cheque, money
order or cash; or
•
Over the phone, by contacting Customer Service on (03) 5153 9500; or
•
Cheque or money order (made payable to East Gippsland Shire Council) posted to
PO Box 1618 BAIRNSDALE, VIC, 3875.
Please quote
FOI477 to make the payment.
Supervised inspection of documents
As 2 documents are subject to copyright subsisting in persons other than the Council, we have
determined under section 23(1)(a) and 23(3)(c) of the FOI Act to allow you a reasonable
opportunity to inspect those documents under the supervision of a Council of icer, rather than
provide you with an electronic copy of the documents.
As explained above, access to one of these documents is subject to a third-party business’s
review rights. Accordingly, you wil only be able to access the document through supervised
inspection once the third party’s review rights have expired. If the review rights are exercised,
then access wil only occur once a decision is made on that review. You may wish to arrange for
supervised inspection of both documents at the same time or separately.
To schedule a date and time for inspection of this document, please email me at
xxx@xxxxxx.xxx.xxx.xx and quote
FOI477. At the inspection of the document, the documents can
be viewed on a computer screen in person. Please note that you will
not be permit ed to make
any physical or electronic copies of the documents, but you wil be allowed to take notes.
For present purposes, we have allowed 15 minutes for you to inspect both of the documents
(which comprise of 18 pages in total). If you require more time to inspect the documents, then
you will be able to continue to inspect the documents once you have paid for the
additional
inspection time required, calculated at $6.12 for each quarter hour or part of a quarter hour. Once
you have paid for any inspection time required, you wil be permitted to continue with the
inspection.
Review rights
If you are dissatisfied with the access charges set out above, you have the right to seek review of
my decision in relation to the charges, by applying to the VCAT within 60 days of receiving this
notice. Contact details are set out below:
Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal
GPO Box 5408
MELBOURNE VIC 3001
Phone: 1300 01 8228
Email:
xxxxx@xxxx.xxx.xxx.xx
Web:
www.vcat.vic.gov.au
Website: www.eastgippsland.vic.gov.au Twitter: @egsc Email: xxxxxxxx@xxxxxx.xxx.xxx.xx
Please note that the VCAT wil only accept an application for review of access charges if you have
first obtained a certificate from the Victorian Information Commissioner certifying that the matter is
one of sufficient importance for the VCAT to consider. The contact information for the Victorian
Information Commissioner is as shown below:
PO Box 24274
MELBOURNE VIC 3001
Telephone: 1300 006 842
E-mail:
xxxxxxxxx@xxxx.xxx.xxx.xx
Web: www.ovic.vic.gov.au
More information
If you have any questions about this decision, please contact me on 5153 9500 or via email at
xxx@xxxxxx.xxx.xxx.xx and quote
FOI477.
Yours sincerely
Janelle Skipworth
JANELLE SKIPWORTH
Freedom of Information Officer
Website: www.eastgippsland.vic.gov.au Twitter: @egsc Email: xxxxxxxx@xxxxxx.xxx.xxx.xx
Document Outline
