12 August 2020
Ms K Coddington
BY EMAIL: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxx.xxx.xx
In reply please quote:
FOI Request:
FA 20/07/00772
File Number:
OBJ2020/23768
Dear Ms Coddington,
I refer to your email dated 17 July 2020 in which you request access to documents held by the
Department of Home Af airs (the Department) under the
Freedom of Information Act 1982
(the FOI Act).
I am writing to tell you that I intend to refuse your request on the basis that a practical refusal
reason exists. However, before I make a final decision to do this, you have an opportunity to
revise your request to remove the practical refusal reason. This is called a ‘
request consultation
process’. You have 14 days to respond to this notice in one of the ways set out below.
Power to refuse request
Section 24 of the FOI Act provides that if the Department is satisfied that a practical refusal
reason exists in relation to a request, the Department must undertake a consultation process
with you, and if, after that consultation process, the Department remains satisfied that the
practical refusal reason stil exists, the Department may refuse to give you access to the
documents subject to the request.
Practical refusal
A
practical refusal reason exists if either (or both) of the following applies:
(a)
the work involved in the processing of the request would substantially and
unreasonably divert the resources of the Department from its other operations
(b)
the request does not satisfy the requirement in section 15(2)(b) of the FOI Act,
which requires you to provide such information concerning the document you are
seeking access to, to enable the Department to be able to identify it.
6 Chant Street Belconnen ACT 2617
PO Box 25 Belconnen ACT 2616 • Telephone: 02 6264 1111 • Fax: 02 6225 6970 • www.homeaffairs.gov.au
Scope of Request
You have requested access to the following:
I am requesting the statement of requirement, and any preliminary or interim
evaluation reports, and final evaluation report generated from the "You won't be
settled in Australia" public information campaign regarding asylum seekers arriving
by boat ca. 2012-2014.
I am requesting the statement of requirement, and any preliminary or interim
evaluation reports, and final evaluation report generated from the "No Advantage"
public information campaign regarding asylum seekers arriving by boat ca. 2012-
2013.
I am requesting the statement of requirement, and any preliminary or interim
evaluation reports, and final evaluation report generated from the "No Way" public
information campaign regarding asylum seekers arriving by boat ca. 2014-2016.
I am requesting the statement of requirement, and any preliminary or interim
evaluation reports, and final evaluation report generated from the " Don’t throw
your money in the water " public information campaign regarding asylum seekers
arriving by boat ca. 2014-2015.
I am requesting the statement of requirement, and any preliminary or interim
evaluation reports, and final evaluation report generated from the "Don’t be sorry”
public information campaign regarding asylum seekers arriving by boat ca. 2012-
2013.
I am requesting the statement of requirement, sample campaign materials, and any
preliminary or interim evaluation reports, and final evaluation report generated from
the offshore anti-people smuggling public information campaigns regarding asylum
seekers arriving by boat ca. 2016-2018..
I note that you have submitted six separate requests. Given that the subject matter of the six
requests is substantially the same, the Department may treat the requests as a single request
under section 24(2)(b) of the FOI Act.
Reasons for practical refusal
The Department has made a preliminary assessment of the documents that would be captured
by your request.
The Department has identified 420 documents that may be captured by your request. This
assessment results from a search of the Department’s electronic systems, including emails and
other documents.
Whilst the Department has identified that it holds 420 potentially relevant documents in its
electronic systems, it would take the Department an average of 30 seconds per document to
actually search for and retrieve each of those relevant documents. As such, I estimate that it
would take the Department an estimated
4 hours to search for, identify and retrieve the 420
potentially relevant documents from its electronic systems.
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In the event that all these documents would actually be relevant to your request, based on an
average of 1 minute per document, a further
7 hours would be required to collate and create a
schedule of the 420 potentially relevant documents. This would include the retrieval of any emails
which incorporate attachments and the collation of those attachments.
If the Department was to continue to process your request, a decision would need to be made
on access to those documents. Based on an estimate that each document is at least two pages
in length, and that the decision maker would require at least three minutes to review and assess
each page for relevant exemptions, I estimate that it would take at least
42 hours to complete a
decision on access to the documents potentially identified as being relevant to your request.
As such, a minimum total estimated time of
53 hours would be required to process this request.
I am satisfied that the Department would be required to divert significant resources from its
current operations in order to identify, locate and collate the documents held within the
Department, and to make a decision on access to those documents. This diversion would result
in a significant drain on the resources of the area within the Department that would be required
to process this request.
I consider that this would result in this request imposing both a substantial and an unreasonable
diversion of resources of the Department from its other operations and that a practical refusal
reason exists in relation to this request.
Request Consultation Process
You now have an opportunity to revise your request to enable it to proceed. For example, you
may wish to limit your request to the most recent campaign
“Zero Chance” (2018-2019).
Under section 24AB of the FOI Act, you have 14 days to do one of the following:
• withdraw your request;
• make a revised request;
• indicate that you do not wish to revise your request.
If you do not do one of the three things listed above during the consultation period (14 days) or
you do not consult the contact person listed below during this period, your request wil be taken
to have been withdrawn in accordance with section 24AB(7) of the FOI Act.
Contact
Should you wish to revise your request or have any questions in relation to this process, please
do not hesitate to contact Alison Smith at xxx@xxxxxxxxxxx.xxx.xx.
Alison Smith
FOI Of icer | Freedom of Information Section
FOI and Records Management Branch
Data Division | Strategy & Law Enforcement Group
Department of Home Affairs
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