Our reference: FOIREQ22/00171

Dear Lucy Lovich

Freedom of Information request

I refer to your request for access to documents made under the Freedom of
Information Act 1982 (Cth) (the FOI Act) and received by the Office of the
Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) on 6 July 2022.

Scope of your request

In your email you seek access to the following:

“From information reported in FOIREQ22/00111:

1.  the number of staff recruited by the OAIC between 1 April 2021 - 31
March 2022 (including temporary and staff under contract) was 55 staff 2. 
the number of staff who ended their employment with the OAIC between 1
April 2021 - 31 March 2022 (including temporary and staff under contract)
was 59 staff.

I seek access to a breakdown of the number of FOI staff allocated to
conduct duties related to the regulation of FOI duties.

1. how many staff in total actively working on FOI files 2. how many FOI
staff have resigned from 1 July 2021 to todays date 3. how many FOI staff
have been recruited from 1 July to todays date 4. how long do FOI
recruited staff stay - length of employment 5.any briefing document
prepared for the new freedom of information commissioner regarding
staffing in FOI.”

Could you please clarify the scope of your request. Would you please
kindly advise whether by ‘FOI staff allocated to conduct duties related to
the regulation of FOI duties’ and ‘FOI staff ’:

 1. you are seeking information relating to the FOI Regulatory Group who
has functions of conducting FOI complaint investigations, Information
Commissioner reviews and general FOI functions of the office, or
 2. or the Legal team who processes FOI requests received by the OAIC, or
 3. both of the above?

We would be grateful if you can please kindly let us know by close of
business on Tuesday 12 July 2022. If we do not hear from you by this date
we will assume that you are seeking information relating to staff from
both the FOI Regulatory Group and the Legal team.

In order to process your request as efficiently as possible, I will
exclude duplicates and early parts of email streams that are captured in
later email streams from the scope of this request, unless you advise me
otherwise.

We will not identify you as the FOI applicant during and consultation
process. However, documents that are within the scope of your request that
we may need to consult third parties about may contain your personal
information.

Timeframes for dealing with your request

Section 15 of the FOI Act requires this office to process your request no
later than 30 days after the day we receive it. However, section 15(6) of
the FOI Act allows us a further 30 days in situations where we need to
consult with third parties about certain information, such as business
documents or documents affecting their personal privacy.

As we received your request on 6 July 2022, we must process your request
by 5 August 2022.

Disclosure Log

Documents released under the FOI Act may be published online on our
disclosure log, unless they contain personal or business information that
would be unreasonable to publish.

Next Steps

Could you please respond to this email with a clarification of the scope
of your request, by close of business Tuesday 12 July 2022.

If you would like to discuss this matter, please contact me on my contact
details set out below.

Regards

[1][IMG] Toby Shanks | Paralegal

Legal Services

Office of the Australian
Information Commissioner

GPO Box 5218 Sydney NSW 2001 |
[2]oaic.gov.au

1300 363 992 |
[3][email address]
[4]Facebook | [5]LinkedIn | [6]Twitter | [7]Subscribe [8]Subscribe to
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Notice:

The information contained in this email message and any attached files may
be confidential information, and may also be the subject of legal
professional privilege. If you are not the intended recipient any use,
disclosure or copying of this email is unauthorised. If you received this
email in error, please notify the sender by contacting the department's
switchboard on 1300 488 064 during business hours (8:30am - 5pm Canberra
time) and delete all copies of this transmission together with any
attachments.

References

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2. http://www.oaic.gov.au/
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4. http://www.facebook.com/OAICgov
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Dear Lucy Lovich

Freedom of information request no. FOIREQ22/00171

I refer to your request made under the Freedom of Information Act 1982
(Cth) (FOI Act) and received by the Office of the Australian Information
Commissioner (OAIC) on 6 July 2022.

Because your request covers documents which contain information concerning
individuals’ personal information, the OAIC is required to consult the
individuals under s 27A of the FOI Act before making a decision on release
of the documents.

For this reason, the period for processing your request has been extended
by 30 days to allow time to consult (see s 15(6) of the FOI Act). The
processing period for your request will now end on Monday 5 September
2022.

The consultation mechanisms under s 27A apply when we believe the person
concerned may wish to contend that the requested documents are exempt for
reasons of personal privacy. We will take into account any comments we
receive but the final decision about whether to grant you access to the
documents you requested rests with the office of the OAIC.

We will not identify you as the FOI applicant during any consultation
process. However, documents that are within the scope of your request that
we may need to consult third parties about may contain your personal
information.

Kind regards

[1][IMG] Toby Shanks | Paralegal

Legal Services

Office of the Australian
Information Commissioner

GPO Box 5218 Sydney NSW 2001 |
[2]oaic.gov.au

1300 363 992 |
[3][email address]
[4]Facebook | [5]LinkedIn | [6]Twitter | [7]Subscribe [8]Subscribe to
icon Information Matters

Notice:

The information contained in this email message and any attached files may
be confidential information, and may also be the subject of legal
professional privilege. If you are not the intended recipient any use,
disclosure or copying of this email is unauthorised. If you received this
email in error, please notify the sender by contacting the department's
switchboard on 1300 488 064 during business hours (8:30am - 5pm Canberra
time) and delete all copies of this transmission together with any
attachments.

References

Visible links
1. https://www.oaic.gov.au/
2. http://www.oaic.gov.au/
3. mailto:[email address]
4. http://www.facebook.com/OAICgov
5. https://www.linkedin.com/company/office-...
6. https://twitter.com/OAICgov
8. https://www.oaic.gov.au/media-and-speech...

Good afternoon,

Please find attached decision, schedule and documents in relation to your
request FOIREQ22/00171.

Regards,

[1]O A I C logo   Emily Elliott  |  Senior Lawyer

Legal Services

Office of the Australian
Information Commissioner

GPO Box 5218 Sydney NSW 2001  |
 [2]oaic.gov.au

+61 2 9284 9852| 
[3][email address]
[7]Subscribe [8]Subscribe to
[4]Facebook | [5]LinkedIn | [6]Twitter |   icon Information
Matters

Notice:

The information contained in this email message and any attached files may
be confidential information, and may also be the subject of legal
professional privilege. If you are not the intended recipient any use,
disclosure or copying of this email is unauthorised. If you received this
email in error, please notify the sender by contacting the department's
switchboard on 1300 488 064 during business hours (8:30am - 5pm Canberra
time) and delete all copies of this transmission together with any
attachments.

References

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2. https://www.oaic.gov.au/
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4. https://aus01.safelinks.protection.outlo...
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6. https://aus01.safelinks.protection.outlo...
8. https://www.oaic.gov.au/updates/sign-up/