Dear IP Australia,

I hereby request, under the Freedom of Information Act (1982),
copies of the following documents:

1) C2012/12282 Trans Pacific Partnership Free Trade Agreement - Pharmaceutical Provisions
2) C2012/12298 Trans Pacific Partnership 2012 Free Trade Agreement - Round 14 Negotiations - Leesburg (Washington DC) USA
3) C2012/12458 Trans Pacific Partnership Free Trade Agreement - International Exhaustion/Parallel Importation
4) C2012/12687 Trans Pacific Partnership Free Trade Agreement - Traditional Knowledge - Genetic Resources And Traditional Cultural Expressions
5) C2012/12966 Briefing And Ministerial Correspondence 2012 - Gene Patenting - Domestic Policy
6) C2012/13878 Trans Pacific Partnership 2012 Free Trade Agreement - Round 15 Negotiations - Auckland NZ

I also make the application that all costs for the processing of
this request be waived on the grounds that the release of this
information is in the public interest, will enhance the
transparency of the process and the public debate surrounding
potential legislative changes.

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Regards,

Brendan Molloy
Secretary
Pirate Party Australia

Dear Mr Applegate,

I contend that the proposed $2160 fee for fulfilling this request is excessive, that the request has been wrongly assessed and contend that the fee should not be charged.

A substantially similar request was submitted to the Attorney General's Department by me that was fulfilled yesterday, which included significant processing, with no question contesting that the request was not in the public interest, and without charges applied[1].

Given that the ambit of the request is substantially the same, and has merely been sent to a different department as the AGD does not have the documents requested in this request, I find it dubious that this request would not be considered in the public interest.

You also have not supplied a justification as to why you believe this request to not be in the public interest, which makes it difficult to address your core concerns and justifications, and leads me to believe that you are being obstructionistic.

As the nature of the documents requested are not related to national security, and are in fact relating to a trade agreement that has the potential to require sweeping changes to Australia's legislation in order to be ratified, the unprecedented secrecy surrounding this agreement and related documents is unacceptable.

It is of great importance that the citizens of Australia have access to as much information as possible so that that all stakeholders can provide educated input at a stage where the agreement can still be changed prior to signing. I note that all citizens are stakeholders in an agreement that has the potential to change legislation such as intellectual property and labour laws, as worker rights affect everyone and copyright applies automatically to everything that is considered a copyrightable work under the Copyright Act in this country.

In summary, this request is substantially similar to another request that was considered to be in the public interest, and no fees were required to be paid. The documents requested are in the public interest due to the lack of transparency around this agreement and a lack of solid information that allows the stakeholders to build an informed opinion regarding this trade agreement.

I request that this request is re-assessed and that all fees are waived. It would be an affront to democracy to deny this request.

[1] https://www.righttoknow.org.au/request/t...

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Regards,

Brendan Molloy
Secretary
Pirate Party Australia

Dear Ms Carroll,

I do not consent to any extension given the already utilised 30 day extension.

--
Regards,

Brendan Molloy
Secretary
Pirate Party Australia

Dear Mr Wright,

With regard to my request under the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (Cth), I contend that the charge has been wrongly assessed, and that the charge imposed on the request should be reduced, or not imposed.

The precedent set by the Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC) with regard to defining "substantially the same" implies that it is the essence of the request, and not the specific content, that determines what "substantially the same" means. In the situation of DIAC, requests for separate files relating to detention were treated in an identical manner as the gist of the requests were considered similar enough, regardless of whether or not that file contained one page or a thousand pages[1][2]. I contend that this also applies to IP Australia and the Attorney-General's Department insofar as the requests involve similar and related content.

Therefore I maintain that ambit is not dissimilar to that of the request I referred to in my previous email. At no point did IP Australia state that this request would be an unreasonable diversion of resources nor constituted a practical refusal reason, and you yourself state in your response that you do not consider the time spent on this request as excessive. No opportunity was granted to me to further limit the scope of my request in order to lower the time, and therefore potential cost, of the request, and by the nature of what is essentially a 'bait and switch tactic,' I continue to attest that IP Australia is being obstructionistic.

It is in the public interest that any information that is held by the public service that can inform debate about potential legislative changes should be in the public domain. This is especially true of information pertaining to gene patents, as there is quite a limited amount of information specific to the Australian legislative environment, which would go a long way to informing the discourse surrounding issues around patenting genes and genetic material. It is worth more to the Australian community to have these documents released than having an unreasonable charge levied that will result in the documents never being released.

I contend that the charge has been wrongly assessed, that there is precedent to prove that the ambit of the requests being compared are substantially the same and should therefore have no fees levied, and that it is strongly in the public interest to have these documents released that can inform the public debate around the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, and gene patenting.

[1] https://www.righttoknow.org.au/request/2...
[2] https://www.righttoknow.org.au/request/1...

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Regards,

Brendan Molloy
Councillor
Pirate Party Australia

Dear Ms Carroll,

I am indeed requesting an internal review.

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Regards,

Brendan Molloy
Councillor
Pirate Party Australia

To whom it may concern,

It has now been more than two weeks since I requested an internal review of this FOI request.

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Regards,

Brendan Molloy
Councillor
Pirate Party Australia