Minutes of the ANU Council's Audit and Risk Committee meeting held in March 2025
Dear Australian National University,
I’m writing to make a request under the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (Cth) for the minutes of the ANU Council's Audit and Risk Committee meeting held in March 2025. I’m after the full minutes incl. any attachments or papers that were considered during the meeting.
I understand there might be some processing steps or clarifictions needed, so just let me know if anything’s missing on my end. Happy to provide whatever details you need.
Yours faithfully,
Bruce Phillip Jost
Dear Bruce,
On 18 November 2025, the Australian National University (the University) received your request for access to documents under the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (the FOI Act).
The University has taken your request to be as follows:
“… the minutes of the ANU Council's Audit and Risk Committee meeting held in March 2025. I’m after the full minutes incl. any attachments or papers that were considered during the meeting.”
Your request has been assigned the case number 202500294.
Processing Timeframe
The statutory time frame for processing your request is 30 calendar days from day after the date your request was received by the University. You should therefore expect a decision from us by Thursday 18 December 2025.
This period of 30 days may be extended if we need to consult third parties, impose a charge or for other reasons. We will advise you in writing if this happens.
We will contact you using the email address you provided. Please advise if you would prefer us to use an alternative means of contact. If you have any questions regarding your request, please feel free to contact the FOI Team via the functional email [ANU request email].
The FOI Team’s workload is currently at very high levels due to the unprecedented volume of FOI requests.
We are using our best endeavours to process all requests expeditiously however there may be some slippage due to the current workload. We will keep in touch with you and advise if there are any significant delays, and will, if necessary, seek extensions as permitted by the Act.
Yours sincerely,
FOI Team
University Governance Office
The Australian National University
Email: [ANU request email]
Web: https://www.anu.edu.au/freedom-of-inform...
TEQSA Provider ID: PRV12002 (Australian University) | CRICOS Provider Code: 00120C | ABN: 52 234 063 906
Dear Bruce,
Thank you very for your request to the Australian National University (the University) for access to documents under the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (the FOI Act) regarding the March 2025 minutes for the Audit & Risk Committee, which was received on 18 November 2025. Your original request is outlined at the bottom of this thread.
Update on your request
• Your request is underway / is being processed.
• An initial search has yielded a package comprising 379 pages – not including the minutes.
• There are also several third parties identified in that package (this means that the University would need to take the time to consult with those third parties).
Refinement sought
Reasoning
Because there is a significant volume of material to review/process, we would like to seek refinement from you to help us process your request in a timely fashion. This is for the following reasons:
• As stated above, there are at least 379 pages in scope of your current request.
• Using a conservative estimate, it would take a minimum of 31.33 hours just to review the 379-page package (based on a baseline estimate from experience that reviewing documents thoroughly under the FOI Act takes on average 5 minutes per page; this time estimate does not take into account the retrieval and conversion of any potential non-PDF’ed attachments; it does not take into account time spent manually withholding information if required; and it does not take into account the time spent identifying and engaging with third parties for consultation).
Are you willing to refine your request?
Given the above, would you therefore be willing to refine your request further? E.g. you could specify exactly what subject matter you are interested in within the minutes / meeting package. Any refinement detail you can provide would be appreciated. We may still work with you if further refinement is necessary (which is sometimes more apparent as we are processing/reviewing the relevant documents).
If yes, please get back to us as soon as possible – and ideally no later than COB this Friday 21 November 2025, so that we can engage with you over the following business days.
If you cannot refine your request any further, we may need to work with you to consider other mechanisms under the FOI Act – be they charging for this request, an agreed 30-day extension under section 15AA of the FOI Act, or any other mechanism that can result in a clear decision for you.
Thank you for your understanding as we work to process your request,
FOI Team
University Governance Office
The Australian National University
Email: [ANU request email]
Web: https://www.anu.edu.au/freedom-of-inform...
TEQSA Provider ID: PRV12002 (Australian University) | CRICOS Provider Code: 00120C | ABN: 52 234 063 906
Dear Freedom of Information team,
I'm happy to revise the request to only be for:
* The minutes of the meeting
* The table of contents listing the title of the paper and the name/position of the person presenting the paper, (and ideally length) for the agenda package.
Any more specific information will be requested separately at a later date.
I hope this request is more practical and easier to fulfil.
Yours sincerely,
Bruce Phillip Jost
Acknowledged with thanks, Bruce - that helps a lot in terms of processing time.
If we have any further asks of you in terms of the scope of your request, as we and the subject matter experts review the relevant document(s), we will be in touch.
Thank you as well for your prompt reply,
FOI Team
University Governance Office
The Australian National University
Email: [ANU request email]
Web: https://www.anu.edu.au/freedom-of-inform...
TEQSA Provider ID: PRV12002 (Australian University) | CRICOS Provider Code: 00120C | ABN: 52 234 063 906
Dear Bruce,
I refer to your revised request for access to documents received by the Australian National University (the University) under the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (the FOI Act) as follows:
"* The minutes of the meeting
* The table of contents listing the title of the paper and the name/position of the person presenting the paper, (and ideally length) for the agenda package."
Update on Your Request
• Two documents were located and have been reviewed in relation to your request.
• Within the in-scope material is information concerning the business, commercial or financial information of a third party organisation.
• Under such circumstances, the University is required to consult with the organisation concerned (under section 27 of the FOI Act) before making a decision on the release of those documents.
• We have already reached out to this third party organisation, and hope to hear back from them this week so that we can provide you with a response this side of Christmas. However, please keep in mind that that they may not be able to give us an answer in that timeframe – especially with staff in both the public and private sectors taking leave as the Christmas / New Year season approaches.
• While we are waiting to hear back from the third party organisation, we will be progressing all final reviews and actions of your case so that a response can be sent to you shortly after we hear back from the consultation.
Extension for Consultation
Due to this consultation, the period for processing your request has been extended by 30 days in order to allow our agency time to consult with that organisation (section 15(6) of the FOI Act). The processing period for your request will technically now end on Monday 19 January 2026. As stated above, we are hoping to provide you with a response before then, as soon as we hear back from the consultee organisation.
We appreciate your patience and engagement thus far as we process your request.
Yours sincerely,
FOI Team
University Governance Office
The Australian National University
Email: [ANU request email]
Web: https://www.anu.edu.au/freedom-of-inform...
TEQSA Provider ID: PRV12002 (Australian University) | CRICOS Provider Code: 00120C | ABN: 52 234 063 906
Good news, Bruce
We have heard back from the consultee and will aim to provide you with a response to this this side of Christmas.
Thank you again,
FOI Team
University Governance Office
The Australian National University
Email: [ANU request email]
Web: https://www.anu.edu.au/freedom-of-inform...
TEQSA Provider ID: PRV12002 (Australian University) | CRICOS Provider Code: 00120C | ABN: 52 234 063 906
Dear Freedom of Information,
Thank you for the update. I look forward to hearing from you soon.
Yours sincerely,
Bruce Phillip Jost
Our apologies, Bruce
We were not able to get to complete this case before Christmas. We will endeavour to get you our response as soon as we're able upon the new year.
Thank you again and hope you have a restful break,
FOI Team
University Governance Office
The Australian National University
Email: [ANU request email]
Web: https://www.anu.edu.au/freedom-of-inform...
TEQSA Provider ID: PRV12002 (Australian University) | CRICOS Provider Code: 00120C | ABN: 52 234 063 906