English subtitled copy of the DIBP funded film "The Journey"
Posty made this Freedom of Information request to Department of Home Affairs
This request has been closed to new correspondence from the public body. Contact us if you think it ought be re-opened.
Dear Department of Immigration and Border Protection,
I am aware of another request for the 'transcript' of the movie "The Journey" (https://www.righttoknow.org.au/request/t...) however that does not request an actual subtitled version of the movie, only a transcript.
I request:
A) An english subtitled full length version of the film "The Journey".
Yours faithfully,
DA
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Information updated 17 November 2015
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Yours Sincerely
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Our references: FA 16/04/00703; ADF2016/15339
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E: [email address]
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Our references: FA 16/04/00703; ADF2016/15339
Good afternoon
I refer to your request to seek access to the following:
A) An english subtitled full length version of the film "The Journey".
The purpose of this email is to advise that an English subtitled version
of the film titled ‘The Journey’ has been posted to the internet (Youtube)
by the broadcast company, this has been done with the Department’s
approval. To view the film you can use the following link.
See: [1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKnPhSb9...
In light of the film being published with English subtitles the Department
seeks your agreement to withdraw this FOI request. Please confirm in
writing that you withdraw this FOI request by Friday 6 May 2016.
Yours sincerely
Janelle Raineri
Assistant Director | Freedom of Information Section
Information Management Branch | Corporate Services Division
Corporate Group
Department of Immigration and Border Protection
P: 02 6264 1580
E: [2][email address]
Please note I am out of the office from 2:30 PM on Tuesday, Thursday and
Friday
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Dear Janelle,
Excellent!
I am very happy to see that the film complete with english subtitles has been posted to youtube.
I am however confused that you are asking me to 'withdraw' my request - don't you mean that the "Department of Immigration and Border Protection believe they have fulfilled your FOI request"? is this a procedure thing that I'm not understanding? is this just a wording error? This is my first request.
Why would you ask for me to withdraw a request when you completed it?
Thanks for the relatively prompt reply by the way! I know you have a lot to work through.
Yours sincerely,
Derek Adams
Good morning Mr Adams
Thank you for your email below.
The withdrawal of your request is a technical requirement of the FOI Act. The documents you have sought access to under the FOI Act have not been released to you under that legislative framework. However, given that the document has been released, albeit outside the formal framework of the FOI Act, we will consider your request withdrawn, and will close it on our register.
With kind regards
Alison Smith
FOI Officer | Freedom of Information Section
Information Management Branch | Corporate Support Division
Department of Immigration and Border Protection
E| [email address]
Please consider the environment before printing this email
Patrick Conheady left an annotation ()
The statement that 'The withdrawal of your request is a technical requirement of the FOI Act' is either false or incomplete (take your pick). There is certainly nothing in the Act which says that you have to withdraw your request.
The statement is only true in the sense that, if you do in fact want to withdraw your request, then you have to withdraw it.
There are exemptions in the FOI Act for documents which are already publicly available for purchase: FOI Act s 12, but there is no exemption where the information is publicly available for free (there is also an exemption in the definition of 'document' in s 4 for reference material but a video is hardly reference material). It would be slightly rude of an FOI applicant to use an agency's FOI officers as their own private research assistant to gather documents which are already available on the Internet, so I appreciate the common sense of agencies' general practice of asking for FOI requests for already-published documents to be withdrawn.
However, this instance might be slightly cheeky. They published the document after you requested it, ostensibly in response to your request -- but if you withdraw your request, they can say they didn't. Maybe they honestly think it would cause too much trouble if they uploaded a copy of the video to Right to Know. Or maybe they want to avoid the fact that they had an English subtitled version of the movie all along, told the media that they wouldn't release an English version, sat by while the ABC paid an interpreter to create an independent English version, and then finally released the English subtitled version when compelled under FOI.
At the time you lodged the request, the document was unquestionably covered by the FOI Act and liable to be released. You are entitled to have you request recognised as valid and have it formally satisfied.
I hope you don't mind that I've put in an FOI request myself to find out whether it is in fact a pure coincidence that the Department published the video in the shadow of an FOI request: <https://www.righttoknow.org.au/request/d...>.
An agency cannot decide that you should withdraw your request. If, hypothetically, they were to say 'We think this request has no utility so you probably want to withdraw it' and you didn't respond at all, then fine, that can be treated as withdrawal by you (and this happens regularly). However, in this case you have every right to continue to insist on an actual decision being made.
If you do insist on the agency completing your request, the worst that can happen is that they serve you with a bill for charges (which itself would be illuminating), and you can always withdraw the request at that point and not have to pay a cent.
While I am writing, congratulations on getting the government to release information which it was trying to keep private. You are doing your bit for a more transparent Commonwealth.
Posty left an annotation ()
The asking for my withdrawal might be a legal technicality thing, but I think the DIBP FOI officer is functionally 'splitting hairs' here regarding the result.
The government said that there would be no english version made available, reported by at least 3 [1,2,3] publications - including DIBP spokespeople.
The ABC even paid a translator to translate it [4], when likely it was available all along but not to the public.
Practically this request achieved the desired result - it was not available in march when it was requested, and it was uploaded to youtube May 2nd - a day before the successful response.
Maybe this is because DIBP saw the writing on the wall due to the request and instructed the broadcast company to release it anyway, hence them not being legally compelled to do it? I don't know. Maybe someone more familiar with the process could explain.
I'm happy it's done now, and in my mind DIBP have completed this as per my request! :)
[1] http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/p...
[2] http://mashable.com/2016/03/31/the-journ...
[3] http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/2016/03...
[4] (~2min mark) https://twitter.com/theweeklytv/status/7...