FREEDOM OF INFORMATION – AUSTRALIA

ABC in cover-up claim over Louise Milligan’s tweets about MP Andrew Laming

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Original article by Janet Fife-Yeomans
The Daily Telegraph – Page: Online : 26-Oct-21

The ABC is under renewed scrutiny over Andrew Laming’s defamation payout after the public broadcaster declined to release 161 documents concerning the case. The documents in question involve internal discussions regarding the tweets of journalist Louise Milligan about the federal Liberal MP. The documents were requested via freedom of information laws, but the ABC released copies of the documents in which most of the text had been blacked out. One Nation MP Mark Latham has urged Communications Minister Paul Fletcher to release all documents relating to the Laming case.

CORPORATES
AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION, LIBERAL PARTY OF AUSTRALIA, ONE NATION PARTY, AUSTRALIA. DEPT OF INFRASTRUCTURE, TRANSPORT, REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND COMMUNICATIONS

National cabinet secrecy a convenient lie

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Original article by Ronald Mizen
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 10 : 28-Sep-21

Constitutional law expert Professor Anne Twomey has attacked legislation that will see the national cabinet become a sub-committee of the federal cabinet. The legislation has been quickly introduced after the Federal Court rejected an attempt by the federal government to label it as such, so as to exclude it from freedom of information laws. Twomey says the legislation is seeking to achieve a "convenient lie", while former counsel assisting the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption Geoffrey Watson, SC, has labelled the legislation as a "joke".

CORPORATES
FEDERAL COURT OF AUSTRALIA, NEW SOUTH WALES. INDEPENDENT COMMISSION AGAINST CORRUPTION

Agent of interference: How Labor’s top lawyer steered bureaucrats against ex-PM

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Original article by Joe Kelly
The Australian – Page: 1 & 4 : 31-Jan-20

Andrew Cooper, the Australian organiser of the 2019 Conservative Political Action Conference, was asked to register under the federal government’s Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme. The request was made by the Attorney General’s Department. According to documents released under freedom of information laws, Labor frontbencher Mark Dreyfus encouraged department officials to investigate whether the CPAC would trigger registration requirements under the scheme at a meeting in July. The Department also asked former prime minister Tony Abbott to register under the scheme as he was to speak at the event; both Cooper and Abbott rejected the requests. A spokesperson for Dreyfus says the opposition cannot tell public servants to do anything.

CORPORATES
AUSTRALIA. ATTORNEY-GENERAL’S DEPT, AUSTRALIAN LABOR PARTY

Treasurer gets no mail on exemptions

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Original article by Joanna Mather
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 8 : 13-Aug-15

The Australian Labor Party (ALP) says exempting private companies from publishing their tax affairs is a capitulation to the "big end of town" and has nothing to do with wealthy families fearing kidnapping. The ALP has used a Freedom of Information request to confirm no concerns were put by email or letter to senior ministers. Shadow treasurer Andrew Leigh says the government is proposing extra secrecy within the tax laws without a single person having written of any concerns.

CORPORATES
AUSTRALIAN LABOR PARTY, AUSTRALIA. DEPT OF THE TREASURY, AUSTRALIAN TAXATION OFFICE, TEYS BROS (HOLDINGS) PTY LTD