ATO Social media blocking

Steve Davies made this Freedom of Information request to Australian Taxation Office

This request has been closed to new correspondence from the public body. Contact us if you think it ought be re-opened.

Response to this request is long overdue. By law, under all circumstances, Australian Taxation Office should have responded by now (details). You can complain by requesting an internal review.

Dear Australian Taxation Office,

In response to my request for information concerning why you blocked me from viewing your social media account you provided a heavily redacted document.

What you did in your response was redact not only the names of the officials who were a party to this decision. What you also did was redact all the comments made by those officials.

ATO response https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B5xsIk...

I responded to you (the ATO) as follows

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5xsIkh...

12 days ago I emailed the ATO with a view to discussing my response with them.

They have remained silent and are obviously attempting to stonewall.

The fact of the matter is that the ATO has sought to label a member of the public (me) a 'troll' for no other reason than they do not like the disclosures being made about its corrupted and corrupting culture.

In doing so the ATO has set a precedent where it can besmirch an individuals reputation to protect itself from serious analysis and criticism concerning its own conduct.

As outlined in my response to they ATO they know this full well.

At no time have I trolled the ATO - labelling me a troll is simply the best they could come up with given the nature of my criticisms of them. In doing so the ATO has illustrated they they think they are above public accountability. Which, key again, confirms what I have had to say about its corrupted and corrupting corporate culture.

By any reasonable standard the ATO's conduct in this matter constitutes a denial of natural justice as, in the absence of being provided with the content of the email exchanges between officials that result in the decision two label someone a troll it is impossible for the besmirched individual to respond.

If law enforcement officers conducted themselves in this manner there would be hell to pay.

Yours faithfully,

Steve Davies