OFFICIAL

Good afternoon,

 

I refer to your correspondence of 28 November 2023, seeking access to the
following under the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (FOI Act):

 

“Can you please advise whether;

 

Former staffer Bruce Lehrmann was a corporate credit card holder OR a
co-signatory on another credit card;

 

If it is standard practice for a Minister to authorise co-signatories on
their credit cards; and

 

If the purchase of alcohol is authorised under the Department of Defence,
for credit card use.”

 

Practical refusal

I am writing to advise that, in its current form, your request is not
considered valid under section 15(2)(b) [Requests for access] of the FOI
Act, as you have not provided enough information regarding the documents
you are seeking, to enable a responsible officer of the agency to identify
them. 

 

Section 24(1) of the FOI Act provides that:

(1) If an agency or Minister is satisfied, when dealing with a request for
a document that a practical refusal reason exists in relation to the
request (see section 24AA), the agency or Minister:

(a) must undertake a request consultation process (see section 24AB); and

(b) if, after the request consultation process, the agency or Minister is
satisfied that the practical refusal reason still exists—the agency or
Minister may refuse to give access to the document in accordance with the
request.

 

Section 24AA(1) of the FOI Act provides that:

(1) For the purposes of section 24, a practical refusal reason exists in
relation to a request for a document if either (or both) of the following
applies:

(a) the work involved in processing the request:

(i) in the case of an agency – would substantially and unreasonably divert
the resources of the agency from its other operations; or

(b) the request does not satisfy the requirement in paragraph 15(2)(b)
(identification of documents).

 

Furthermore, Paragraph 2.33 of the Information Commissioner’s (IC) FOI
Guidelines provides:

 

The right of access under the FOI Act is to existing documents, rather
than to information. The FOI Act does not require an agency or minister
to create a new document in response to a request for access, except in
limited circumstances where the applicant seeks access in a different
format or where the information is stored in an agency computer system
rather than in discrete form (see Part 3 of these Guidelines). A request
may nevertheless be framed by reference to a document that contains
particular information. 

 

As you have sought access to information rather than documents, your
request is not considered valid in its current form.

 

On this basis, Defence intends to refuse your request. However, I am
writing to provide you with an opportunity to revise your request. This is
called a ‘request consultation process’ as set out under section 24AB of
the FOI Act. You have 14 days to respond to this notice in one of the ways
set out below.

 

Request consultation process

In accordance with section 24AB of the FOI Act, Defence is required to
consult with you, in relation to the intention to refuse access to your
request in its current form. As such, you now have an opportunity to
revise your request to enable it to proceed.

 

Revising your request can mean narrowing the scope of the request to make
it more manageable, or explaining in more detail the documents you wish to
access. For example, by providing more specific information about exactly
what documents you are interested in.

 

We ask that you please specify the exact documents to which you are
seeking access, as answering questions is not a function of the Freedom of
Information section.

 

You now have 14 days to contact me and do one of the following:

 

a.    withdraw your request

b.    revise the scope of your request

c.    indicate that you do not wish to revise your request.

 

If you revise your request in a way that adequately addresses the
practical refusal reason outlined above, we will recommence processing
your request.

 

If you do not contact me within 14 days, that is by 5pm, 14 December 2023,
your FOI request will be taken to have been withdrawn under
subsection 24AB(7) and will not be dealt with any further.

 

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions.

 

Kind regards,

 

Erin
FOI Case Manager
Media and Information Disclosure Branch

Ministerial & Executive Coordination and Communication Division

Department of Defence

 

[1]Freedom of information requests | About | Defence

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References

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