Consultation on Part 14 of the FOI Guidelines — Disclosure Log

The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) is seeking comments from interested stakeholders on the content, practical implications, readability and accessibility of updates to Part 14 of the FOI Guidelines: Disclosure Log (v 1.8).

Background

The Australian Information Commissioner may issue guidelines under s 93A of the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (FOI Act). Section 93A of the FOI Act requires Australian Government ministers and agencies to have regard to these guidelines when performing a function or exercising a power under the FOI Act.

Part 14 of the FOI Guidelines assists Australian Government agencies and ministers subject to the FOI Act to establish and maintain a Disclosure Log as required by s 11C of the FOI Act.

The proposed revisions to Part 14 include:

• an introduction with key messages for agencies and ministers
• encouraging agencies to explain on their disclosure log why a document cannot be published (if documents are only available on request)
• ensuring agency disclosure log practices reflect the information in the introduction to the disclosure log
• changing the focus in the disclosure log decision making section to emphasise that agencies and ministers are not deciding to publish documents on their disclosure log (this is required by s 11C) but rather they are deciding whether an exception to the publication requirement exists such that it would be unreasonable to publish the documents
• emphasising that agencies and ministers should keep records of decisions not to publish documents on their disclosure log
• clarifying that when a review decision is made giving greater access to requested documents, a new disclosure log entry should be created
• implementation of recommendations made in the Freedom of Information Commissioner’s report ‘Disclosure Log Desktop Review – 2026’ (August 2026) including in relation to agencies publishing their minister’s disclosure log entries, increasing searchability, providing sufficient and accurate descriptions of entries, adhering to publication time frames (10 working days) and accurate reporting of disclosure log statistics
• updated links and references to resources to support compliance with disclosure log requirements.

Key changes

1. The introduction to Part 14 ([14.1]–[14.5]) includes key messages for agencies and ministers.
2. A Disclosure Log checklist has been added at Annexure B
3. [14.11] recommends, as better practice, that agencies and ministers include the reason why released documents cannot be published on the disclosure log (where access is provided on request).
4. [14.13] has been updated to ensure that agency disclosure log practices are accurately reflected in the introduction to the agency’s disclosure log.
5. [14.22] in the current version of Part 14 has been deleted (it refers to a Disclosure Log determination that has expired). There is currently no Information Commissioner determination in effect.
6. [14.24] emphasises that the disclosure log requirement only applies to information to which the FOI applicant has been given access. As a result, where a large amount of information has been deleted from a document before release, the blank pages do not need to be published.
7. [14.25] has been updated to clarify that the disclosure log requirement applies when greater access is given following review.
8. [14.35] clarifies that agencies should include a statement if the agency’s disclosure log includes documents released in response to a request to the minister, as well as providing a way for the public to search for the minister’s disclosure log entries.
9. [14.60] recommends agencies include the new ‘Access to Information’ icon on their website.
10. [14.73] removes the reference to the Australian Signals Directorate’s endorsement of Adobe Acrobat DC Pro (2017) and suggests agencies undertake their own assessment of the effectiveness of redaction software to permanently remove redacted information.
11. [14.82] suggests that agencies without a case management system to record disclosure log decision making maintain an internal register to record this information.
12. [14.84] emphasises the importance of agencies correctly reporting their disclosure log statistics to the OAIC each quarter.

How to make comments

Submissions can be sent to:

Email:  guidanceandpublications@oaic.gov.au

Post: GPO Box 5288, Sydney, NSW 2001

The closing date for comments is Friday 4 September 2026.

The OAIC intends to publish all submissions on the OAIC’s website. The OAIC is unable to consider any submissions made in confidence, so please ensure your submission does not contain confidential information that you do not want to be made public.

Although you can lodge submissions electronically or by post, electronic lodgement is preferred. To help us meet our accessibility obligations, we would appreciate you providing your submission in a web accessible format or, alternatively, in a format that allows us to easily convert it to HTML code — for example Rich Text Format (.rtf) or Microsoft Word (.doc or .docx).