Telephone calls of regional incubator facilitator Daniel Smith
FOI team,
I would like to see the date, time, destination number, call duration and (where available) geographical origin of all telephone calls made by Regional Incubator Facilitator [Name Hidden] from his telephone number ([Mobile Number Redacted]) to any department telephone number from 1/11/2018 until 22/11/2018 inclusively and from 28/10/2019 until 15/12/2019 inclusively.
Thank you,
Harry Witherspoon
Good morning Mr Witherspoon
I'm writing to request that you please remove the private mobile number of Mr Smith from your request on the Right to Know website.
It is not appropriate to include an individual's personal information in a public forum such as this one. For the sake of processing this request we have noted the number that you provided.
For transparency, I will also write to Right to Know to ask that the information be removed.
In the future, you are welcome to email the FOI team directly to provide that level of detail, however we ask that you are mindful of the information which you are publishing in this forum.
Regards
Erin
FOI Team
Legal, Audit and Assurance Branch
OFFICIAL
Erin
Daniel's phone number is publicly available on the department's website as a regional incubator facilitator with full contact details provided.
https://www.business.gov.au/grants-and-p...
Rather than shielding Mr Smith like a protected species and yet again strong arming right to know into censoring his details with baseless accusations after pretending that you don't know his telephone number ( https://www.righttoknow.org.au/request/6... ), I would advise you and your colleagues to be more mindful of adhering to the FOI Act and to refrain from engaging in abuse of public office given that you are all under investigation.
How's that, Erin?
Harry
Dear Harry
We refer to the attached Freedom of Information request received by the
Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources (the department) on
17 October 2020.
For documents that fall within the scope of the request, it is the
department’s policy to withhold:
· the names, signatures and contact details of junior staff; That
is:
o Commonwealth staff who are not in the Senior Executive Service (SES);
and
o Ministerial staff below the level of Chief of Staff; and
· the mobile phone numbers of SES officers.
The names and other details of SES officers will be released unless the
information is exempt from disclosure.
Confirmation from you that you are not seeking ‘personal information’ (ie.
the names and contact details of any individuals, or any information that
could reasonably identify an individual) may enable a more timely and cost
effective processing of your request.
Therefore, could you please clarify if you a seeking access to personal
information in the documents relating to:
· third parties; and
· Commonwealth staff.
If you are not seeking access to any personal information, you can simply
reply to this email with ‘no personal information requested’.
If you are seeking access to specific types of personal information, could
you please specify.
We look forward to your response at your earliest convenience but no later
than 2 October 2020.
If you have any questions, please contact the FOI team.
Regards
FOI Team
Legal, Audit and Assurance | Corporate & Digital
GPO Box 2013, Canberra ACT 2601
I do not agree to the redaction of telephone numbers or any other details that would conceal the identity of persons employed or contracted by the Department that Mr Smith spoke with during the time periods specified irrespective of their seniority level.
Harry
Dear Harry
Please find attached correspondence in relation to your Freedom of
Information request received on 17 October 2020.
Should you have any queries in relation to this matter, please contact the
FOI team.
Regards
FOI Team
Legal, Audit and Assurance | Corporate & Digital
GPO Box 2013, Canberra ACT 2601
Dear Freedom of Information,
The telephone records may be obtained from [Company Name Hidden] Pty Ltd as per clause 27.3 of the services agreement (available at this https://gofile.io/d/dZhgY0 location).
Alternatively, you may obtain the records by simply retrieving department incoming calls during the time periods and from the telephone number I specified as part of my request.
Yours sincerely,
Harry Witherspoon
Dear Harry,
I refer to our correspondence dated Friday 13 November 2020, in which we
provided you notice of the department’s intention to refuse your request
for information on the grounds that a practical refusal exists.
In our correspondence, we suggested that you consider limiting the scope
of your request to specific documents which may be held within the
department. We note that in your response, you have provided a suggestion
as how to search for records, rather than a revision of the scope of your
request.
In order to assist you, we respond to your suggestions as follows:
- Copies of a contractor’s personal mobile phone records are not
records which ‘relate to the performance of a Commonwealth contract’ and
as such, are not required to be furnished to the department in response to
a request for access under s6C of the FOI Act; and
- The letter which was sent to you outlined that it would take
the department over 38 hours to manually conduct a search of its 4000
pages of call records for the telephone number you have specified. There
is no simple way to ‘retrieve’ incoming calls from particular numbers as
you suggest.
In accordance with the letter sent to you, could you please confirm
whether you wish to:
- Withdraw the request
- Make a revised request; or
- Indicate that you do not wish to revise the request.
FOI Team
Legal, Audit and Assurance Branch | Corporate Division
Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources
GPO Box 2013, Canberra ACT 2601
Legal In Confidence - This transmission is intended only for the use of
the addressee and may contain confidential or legally privileged
information. If you are not the intended recipient, you are notified that
any use or dissemination of this communication is strictly prohibited. If
you have received this transmission in error, please notify me immediately
by telephone and delete copies of this transmission together with any
attachments.
Anonymous
I'm confused as to how Department contractors' calls to Department telephone numbers do not 'relate to the performance of a Commonwealth contract', especially when the contractor's telephone bills are claimed as costs by the contractor from the department?
Also, your IT department will be able to retrieve a list of calls based on the telephone number and date ranges from its VoIP database so that you may create a simple report.
Alternatively, you may even OCR-scan the pages and search the document for the phone number; use your imagination.
In the further alternative, you may embarrassingly decline the request for the benefit of the contractor, only to have it overturned by the OAIC.
Harry
For context, the department has already declined a similar request here:
https://www.righttoknow.org.au/request/t...
The department claimed that it doesn't have the contractor's phone number despite publishing it on its website as a Regional Incubator Facilitator service number, also in the face of the contractor's email signature with the number in plain sight, and with full awareness of the contractor's engagement terms and entity file.
Dear Harry
Please find attached correspondence in relation to your FOI request of 17
October 2020.
Should you have any queries regarding this matter, please contact the FOI
team.
Regards
FOI Team
Legal, Audit and Assurance | Corporate & Digital
GPO Box 2013, Canberra ACT 2601
Dear Department of Industry, Innovation and Science,
Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.
I am writing to request an internal review of Department of Industry, Innovation and Science's handling of my FOI request 'Telephone calls of regional incubator facilitator [Name Hidden]'.
I'm confused as to how Department contractors' calls to Department telephone numbers do not 'relate to the performance of a Commonwealth contract', especially when the contractor's telephone bills are claimed as costs by the contractor from the department?
Also, your IT department will be able to retrieve a list of calls based on the telephone number and date ranges from its VoIP database so that you may create a simple report.
Alternatively, you may even OCR-scan the pages and search the document for the phone number.
A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.righttoknow.org.au/request/t...
Yours faithfully,
Witherspoon
Dear Harry
I confirm receipt of your internal review request received 24 November
2020.
A different decision maker will be appointed for your FOI matter.
The current due date for the internal review decision is on or before 24
December 2020.
Regards
Sasha Pesic
Senior FOI Officer
FOI Team
Legal, Audit and Assurance | Corporate & Digital
GPO Box 2013, Canberra ACT 2601
Our reference: RQ21/00051
Agency reference: 67565
Mr Harry Whitherpoon
Sent by email: [1][FOI #6809 email]
Extension of time application by the Department of Industry, Science,
Energy and Resources
Dear Mr Whitherspoon
I write to advise that on 6 January 2021 the Office of the Australian
Information Commissioner (the OAIC) received an application from the
Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources (the Department)
for an extension of time, to process your internal review request.
The Department has applied for an extension of time under s 54AD of the
Freedom of Information Act 1982 (Cth) because it has been unable to
finalise your request within the initial decision period.
The Department has advised the OAIC that:
o Search results have identified some information which requires third
party consultations to be conducted prior to finalising a decision.
o The additional time is requested is to undertake consultation.
The Department has requested an extension to 29 January 2021. I will take
any comments you may have to make into account when deciding the
application.
Please respond to this email by close of business 15 January 2021. If I do
not hear from you by this date, the decision maker will make a decision on
the basis of the information provided to me by the Department.
You will be notified of the decision once the matter has been finalised.
Further information about extension of time requests may be found on our
website at [2]Extensions of time.
Contact
If you have any questions about this letter, please contact me on 02 9284
9625 or via email [3][email address]. In all
correspondence please include OAIC reference number at the top of this
letter.
Kind regards
[4][IMG] Avanithah Selvarajah | Review and
Investigations Adviser (Legal)
(A/g)
Freedom of information
Office of the Australian
Information Commissioner
GPO Box 5218 Sydney NSW 2001 |
[5]oaic.gov.au
+61 2 9284 9625 |
[6][email address]
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Dear Witherspoon
Please find attached correspondence in relation to your internal review
request of 24 November 2021.
Should you have any queries regarding this matter, please contact the FOI
team.
Regards
FOI Team
Legal, Audit and Assurance | Corporate & Digital
GPO Box 2013, Canberra ACT 2601 | [1][Department of Industry, Science, Energy & Resources request email]
Ben Fairless left an annotation ()
Right to Know has been contacted by the Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources in relation to this request.
Mobile Numbers should be automatically redacted by Right to Know. This was a technical error and we have manually redacted the relevant mobile number.
Any questions in relation to can be directed to contact@righttoknow.org.au.