International Access to Information Day

Session 1

Australian Information Commissioner Elizabeth Tydd

00:00:13:02 - 00:00:51:03

It is wonderful to be here. I'm absolutely thrilled to be here for our first event pre COVID. So – five, six years. Five years. And to share this event with you because it's so important and there is so much to share in this space. I'll briefly provide some overview about International Access to Information Day, which is held every year on the 28th of September.

00:00:51:04 - 00:01:33:14

That annual and global celebration recognizes the community's right to access information in 2024. This year, the theme is mainstreaming access to information and participation in the public sector. I think it's timely and it's timely for a range of reasons, particularly the reasons that will be espoused by our panel today of experts. But before we move to that agenda, I wanted to welcome with great pleasure by Sheridan, who is a senior normal elder who was going to open our events with an acknowledgment of country and a welcome to country as well.

00:01:33:14 - 00:01:39:15

Thank you very much. Thank you.

Senior Ngunnawal Elder Violet Sheridan

00:01:40:00 - 00:01:58:13

Thank you so much. It is a pleasure to be here this morning. Lucky you come today because tomorrow is going to be 12 degrees. But all those that live in Canberra, we know it’s the best city in Australia, but it is my pleasure to be here at International Access Information Day.

00:01:58:14 - 00:02:31:13

I tried to work out who you were and when I talked to this lovely lady she explained. Because so many of our people have been removed and a [part of the] stolen generation. So, they are trying to access their information to where they come from. And a lot of our people are still lost today. But, you know, we talk about the stolen generation that were removed, but we have more kids today that's been removed.

00:02:31:13 - 00:02:59:15

And that same thing is going to be the real problem for them as well. They're going to be lost in the system. But it's good that a department, a government department like yourselves, that they can go to and asks for system to help find their way back home. So, it is my pleasure. I would introduce myself if you don't know me, my name is Senior Ngunnawal Elder Violet Sheridan.

00:03:00:00 - 00:03:25:01

So, I have four children and my oldest is 51 today. And he doesn’t want to be 51. So, I said, well, then 50. I think that they all go back would say 40, so I'll be 77.

00:03:25:01 - 00:03:52:08

I don't want to be 70. I said to him, So I'm going back. I'm 60, so I've got four children. My oldest is 51 today. My youngest is 44 and I have 30 grannies. I've got 24 grannies and six great grandchildren. I just had a new one. His name's Clayton. He’s a gorgeous little thing that is another male, too many males.

00:03:52:09 - 00:04:20:06

But that's a little bit about me. So next time, you'll know my story. So, I always have been taught a Welcome to Country is a traditional Aboriginal blessing, symbolizing the traditional owners of the land welcoming you. But it also shows respect for the first peoples of the land you're meeting on. I suppose it's a little bit about not going into someone else's house to roam unless you're welcome or invited.

00:04:20:07 - 00:04:45:09

The reason for this custom is to protect your spirit while you are on our land. I am a proud nun of a woman as I carry my ancestors in spirit, walking into the future, teaching the next generation, and about the oldest culture in the world. My culture. Then on a well, Aboriginal culture, I'd like to pay my respects to my eldest past, present and emerging and extend that respect.

00:04:45:09 - 00:05:14:10

Any First Nations people here in the room. But I'd also like to acknowledge the commissioners in the room and see out in the room and all the non-Indigenous people in the room and is there anyone else and online. So, in keeping in the general spirit of friendship and reconciliation, it gives me great pleasure once again to welcome you to the land of the normal people.

00:05:14:11 - 00:05:43:09

And on behalf of my family and the opinion of families, I so welcome, welcome, and I wish you all the best because it's an important government department and will assist people that have lost in the system, people that don't know the background. So, thank you all so much. Enjoy your day.

Australian Information Commissioner Elizabeth Tydd

00:05:43:10 - 00:06:23:13

Thank you so much, Violet, and thank you for joining with us. That seems to be my tag that's running from one person to another. Thank you. That was inspirational and also acknowledges just one of the really important use cases for the right to access information, to provide information to people who experienced out of home care and to give them back a sense of identity and a sense of where they sit in a world that is much broader than the one that they were taken to.

00:06:23:14 - 00:06:52:02

So, thank you very much. It really inspires the purpose that we're here today for. So, as I said earlier, it's an absolute pleasure to welcome you to this. My first International Access to Information Day as the Australian Information Commissioner. I'm thrilled to share this event with you. I'm learning a great deal in this new role, and you in particular are a rich source of learning for me.

00:06:52:03 - 00:07:44:03

I hope that's not a unilateral relationship. I hope that we can share information with you today and share learning and in fact, we're committed to that agenda. I think you've already seen that through the work we've been doing with practitioners groups to better understand your needs, to better target those needs and to focus on a twofold approach to making compliance easier, but also to advancing the information access agenda, and that is to build capacity within the APS, but also to explain more to provide guidance and to advocate for better systems, for better operational environments, greater proactive release, all of the things that are going to make your roles a lot easier, but also importantly, to

00:07:44:03 - 00:08:12:03

give you purpose and to ensure that your leaders acknowledge that purpose. So, our commitment to you in uplifting agency capability was made prior to us being advised of the same of this year's international all access to information Day. That mainstreaming within the IPS and building capacity is very much at the forefront of our future agenda as well. And why now?

00:08:12:04 - 00:08:39:08

Why do we need to do this now, especially when the right to access information has been around for a very long time. It's Article 19 of the UN Declaration of Human Rights published in 1948. So, I think when mainstreaming now and that's why the UNESCO has identified this as a focus really because of the changes in our government landscape, particularly digital government.

00:08:39:09 - 00:09:07:15

Digital government has been transformational. If we think about the ease of communication, the reliance upon business analytics, the ready access to data and information, those developments have really transformed the apps and in part digital government has transformed the government. Citizen relationship in many but not all aspects. I want to turn to that issue by way of an example.

00:09:08:00 - 00:09:46:05

This year, our APS survey provided the following results. In 2023, 24 staff costs were 25% higher in processing of before laws than they were in 2223. So, the spend reported to the ISC was 81.66 million compared with 65.34 million in 2022 23. That was driven by an increased in in the time that staff spent on FOI. So, the average staffing days has risen steadily for ten years.

00:09:46:06 - 00:10:47:07

In 2023, 24, the average was 4.2 days, which is 20% higher than 2223, when the average was 3.5 days in 21, 22, this was 33 days. So overall we've seen an elevation in costs and staffing hours, and we need to understand why that is, why compliance appears on those metrics to have become harder. So the outcomes we can speculate about, are they a result of complex requests, ill framed requests, a default position in going to our legal branches for management of FOI applications when really this is very much an administrative decision making regime, and that's a capability that you all possess and it is a prized capability within the APS.

00:10:47:09 - 00:11:16:11

Is it also as a result of the lesser investment in capability building and training and systems to support you in undertaking this really important statutory function? There's one thing that I don't think we can claim is influencing as influencing that drive costs and amounts, and that's the number of applications because they only rose by 1% and they haven't risen in a discernible way over the last decade.

00:11:16:13 - 00:11:55:06

So, we do need to understand this dilemma more. We do need to be looking at providing solutions to what is a trajectory of growth, not a volume, but of time and costs. And we do need to work with you to better understand your environment and to address and try and arrest that trajectory. So, one potential cure is to better harness technology and the other is the one I've mentioned, which is capability uplift these two cures if you like.

00:11:55:07 - 00:12:19:12

We'll discuss today and we'll discuss them with our panel of experts throughout the morning and turn to our experts in the room, particularly our FOI Commissioner, Tony Perrone. Welcome to the event, Tony, and thank you for all the work you've done in backgrounding this event. So much substance has been put into this event as really part of our agenda for uplift.

00:12:19:14 - 00:12:47:02

And thank you also to Rocelle, who is in the room somewhere, who has been front and centre of ensuring that this event is the success that it clearly appears to be. So, it's now my pleasure to introduce our panel of experts. We're extremely pleased to have a panel that comprises experts in governing, applying and preserving information and who offer so much inspiration in this digital environment.

00:12:47:04 - 00:13:12:12

Each one of them bring a particular focus, but our common ground is that they operate in that cutting edge environment and act in the public interest. I'm confident that our panel will inspire us today we have Gayle Milnes, who is the National Data Commissioner, Chris Fechner, who's the chief executive officer of the Digital Transformation Office, and Amanda Cattermole, Chief Executive Officer of Digital Health.

00:13:12:14 - 00:13:42:13

And they will each present and give you some insights into their cutting-edge work. Then we'll have an opportunity to engage with them. Now, Secret here, I'm prepared. Any questions for this panel? So, we're reliant upon you and I am sure that they will provide enough inspiration to stimulate a really valuable discussion. Welcome, panel. Over to Gayle. First of all.

National Data Commissioner Gayle Milnes

00:13:42:14 - 00:14:04:08

Well, thanks very much, Liz. And I'm starting with a frog in my throat, so hopefully it moves on. It's great to be here and like Liz, to see the buzz and the energy in the room. Terrific. I do want to pay my respects to the traditional owners and also to many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders people joining us today.

00:14:04:12 - 00:14:34:07

And thanks to Violet for the inspiring welcome to country. A few weeks ago I had an amazing week in the to reach a national Park West of Alice Springs, and I will cut the Larapinta Trail and had plenty of time then to reflect on the enormous debt of gratitude that we owe Indigenous Australians, in this case the Aranda people, for their custodianship of the land over thousands of years.

00:14:34:09 - 00:15:00:08

As Violet said, the oldest culture in the world, and thanks to Liz and your team for the invitation to speak today and access to information, it's such an important topic, as Liz said, and one that's closely aligned with my role as the National Data Commissioner and the work of my office. So, first point data are valuable national resource.

00:15:00:09 - 00:15:27:00

So as Australian government agencies and many of you will work with Australian government agencies, many of you here today, your custodians of a valuable national resource and that's data about the welfare of Australians, about our natural environment, our data about the Australian economy. There are large integrated assets in my slides going here. Oh, it's already gone. Thank you.

00:15:31:07 - 00:16:01:14

Okay, so here are some of the large integrated assets that we've got. You might be familiar with them. We have great names like Clyde on the personal level, Integrated data set the business longitudinal analysis, data environment. You might know as Blade. Both are administered by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the National Guard, a hub administered by the Australian Institute of Welfare and Domino.

00:16:01:15 - 00:16:31:04

It's got a great name data over multiple instances capturing. But the impressive thing is it captures all the Centrelink administered payments such as family benefits, rent assistance, childcare subsidy, aged pension, AuStudy, Newstart Allowance and the data set is administered by the Department of Social Services. So, this slide gives you a sense of the value of these assets as a whole, but also the richness of their components.

00:16:31:05 - 00:16:55:02

And with them we can see so much pretty much in real time about Australians and how they're faring about our economy, how it's going and about our natural environment. When I was doing my preparation for today, I thought I'd better do a Google search about why data matters. And the first thing that came up was a Forbes quote.

00:16:55:02 - 00:17:18:07

And as it stands, as it turned out, those actually I thought the best one I found in the world and I'll give you some aspects of it in the world today, data is probably the thing that matters most. It can predict events. It can tell us what we need to do next. It can expose inefficiencies and disadvantage. It can reveal the truth.

00:17:18:08 - 00:17:48:09

So how do we use or how do Australian government officials and others use data to warn us about natural disasters to help us manage natural disasters is to tackle violence, domestic violence against women and children, to help farmers know what crops to plant, when to plant them, when to harvest them, to inform the rollout and effectiveness of vaccines, to run the national electricity grid, to administer the payment systems, and to make decisions on interest rate settings.

00:17:48:10 - 00:18:25:05

So, it's all pervasive, data is all pervasive. My second message So what are we doing to increase the availability and use of that public data? Here's some of the use. As I touched on, here we are with a data scheme. So, reflecting the important role of data, the Australian Government's 2023 data and digital strategy restated its commitment to requiring all government entities to make non-sensitive data open by default.

00:18:25:06 - 00:18:53:08

So, it's a really important cornerstone, if you like, of the access agenda, and it's a commitment requiring all government entities so pretty it's a commitment that we all have now. The scheme for sharing Australian government data, we call it the data scheme because it's established by the Data Availability and Transparency Act builds on this on the Government's open data commitment.

00:18:53:09 - 00:19:31:14

It's all about increasing the availability and use of data collected by the Australian Government, and the purpose of that is to deliver public benefit, better government policies, programs and services and world leading research and development. I flick my page, you So how does the data scheme work? So, this picture tries to help you understand that. And if you think about what's up there, those centre boxes there, the first thing is really key.

00:19:31:14 - 00:20:05:07

Part of the legislation is that authorizes Australian government agencies to share the data they hold stated. Otherwise, it provides a legal pathway for them to share data where they don't already have one. So, it's very powerful piece of legislation in that sense. While the Act doesn't require data custodians to share their data, data should take account of the objects of the act when considering a data request.

00:20:05:09 - 00:20:34:07

And the first object of the act is to serve the public interest by promoting better availability of private sector data. So, my guidance to Australian government agencies and officials is look for a way to say yes, share your data safely, but look for a way to say yes. Look for a way to meet the request. Data custodians are also and that's you that's Australian government agencies that set box over the right data.

00:20:34:07 - 00:21:00:06

Custodians are required to share their data to consider a data sharing request within a reasonable period. So, you need to act in a timely way, something that's considered on a case-by-case basis. But to give you a guide within a week, we're looking for you to acknowledge the request within two weeks. If you think you require further information about the request, we're looking for you do that within a two-week period.

00:21:00:06 - 00:21:19:13

Go back and say we need more. Is this really what you want? Can you clarify for us what you're looking for? And within a month we're looking for you to take a decision. If you refuse, the request is a bit of a nudge in the legislation. You must provide reasons in writing and within 28 days of a decision being made.

00:21:19:14 - 00:21:46:03

So, all these things are encouraging you to take the request seriously and respond in a timely way and look for a way to say yes. Importantly, you must also apply the scheme's best practices or safeguards when you're sharing the data, and these are the white boxes around the edge. So just step through those three boxes there, the schemes about sharing Australian government data.

00:21:46:07 - 00:22:20:03

So, data custodians of the Australian government agencies that are custodians of the data, a user is someone that can make a request to the Australian Government Agency and a data service provider is an intermediary, someone that might help the sharing of the data. These best practices around here are what you must apply when you share the data. And this means, for example, you can only share data with an accredited or trusted user, and you must have a data sharing agreement in place.

00:22:20:07 - 00:22:53:07

And that data sharing agreement must apply the data sharing principles, and they go to making sure that you've got the right project for the purposes for which you're sharing the data is a public interest one. You've got the right people that you're working with, people that are appropriately skilled to handle and use the data, the settings, right, the security settings in the privacy settings in particular the data, you're giving only the minimum data needed to answer the question of the project, the appropriate and the minimum necessary and the output.

00:22:53:07 - 00:23:26:11

You've got a good of what way the outputs of the project. And when you do that, you cover off on privacy and ethics considerations. Now, the role of the National Data Commissioner, supported by my office, is to oversee the scheme and to regulate it. And this involves accrediting the entities and checking that they've got the right data and governance management arrangements in place, the right ICT and other security settings and, the people capability to handle the data.

00:23:26:12 - 00:23:49:06

We also make sure the custodians are considering the requests and doing that in a timely way and that scheme participants are responding and that scheme participants are applying the best practices, and we can take enforcement action if scheme participants are not playing by the rules. Another of the regulatory functions is to handle complaints from scheme participants and others.

00:23:49:08 - 00:24:21:09

So, there's a right of reply there. Or another mechanism for learning, another mechanism for accountability. The National Data Commission is also required to keep a public register of scheme participants and data sharing agreements and report annually on the scheme. This is important transparency piece there. So, it's a regulation that brings transparency and trust and positions us to maintain and build the public trust in the data that which that's being shared.

00:24:21:10 - 00:24:45:11

The Commission has other functions that are provided advice and guidance to the Minister and scheme participants about its operation. And we educate Australian government agencies and others about best practice data sharing and handling and provide the tools for you to share your data safely. That takes it to this bottom blue bar here that talks about data discovery and data place.

00:24:45:12 - 00:25:27:05

So, there's two things I want to call out here. The first is that in July we launched the beta version of the Australian Government data catalogue, and researchers can use the catalogue to find data assets held by Australian government agencies. So, this is important accessibility. PACE Right. The catalogue contains about 60,000 data assets. The majority of these are publicly available 3.2. gov dot EU and Geoscience Australia's product catalogue, with an additional 230 restricted data assets contributed by 12 Australian government agencies.

00:25:27:06 - 00:26:02:13

We are encouraging and supporting Australian government agencies to have a complete and up to date inventory of their data assets in place is what you need Australian government agencies to best protect and utilize your data and it's also what you need so you can contribute your assets to the data catalogue and people can find the data assets that you hold and then they can make a request for that data as you complete your data inventories, we're asking you to flag data assets if they contain information about Indigenous Australians.

00:26:02:15 - 00:26:32:11

These relate very closely to the points that my pilot raised. We've made a commitment to provide greater access to Indigenous communities about Indigenous data, and this is one way that we can deliver on that commitment and then it will make it easier for Indigenous Australians to then find the data that they're interested in. The catalogues integrated with data database, which is our second tool it's referred to here.

00:26:32:12 - 00:27:00:02

After completing a search, the users directly to where the data asset is publicly available or to date a place to make a request for their asset data places. The digital platform that we've built that brings together those wanting access to data with data custodians. Some describe it as a dating app for data, other describe it as the PDF The data.

00:27:00:04 - 00:27:29:03

It's both actually for those Australian government agencies that don't a digital system for managing your data sharing, I encourage you to take a look at data place and start using it. It'll give you a line of sight on what that how do you share who you share it with and the purposes for which you share it. You can also be assured then that you shared the data using the best data, using the data schemes, best practices.

00:27:29:05 - 00:28:09:15

So, there's a management piece in there and there's an important assurance piece. If you're using data place, because all of those best practices are basically coded into place. So having problems with this frog. So how are we going to use in, and we've laid the foundations for the data scheme, we've built the tools for sharing data safely data place in the Australian Government data catalogue that I mentioned, and there are now 32 accredited entities, 28 users and 12 data support service providers.

00:28:10:00 - 00:28:45:00

This gives you a sense of who they are. A good smattering there of Australian government agencies. Some of our most data active Australian government agencies, most and territories and seven universities. So, we now have a core trusted data sharing community and most importantly we're seeing data requests being made using data place and data being shared. We've registered four data sharing agreements that helped create the National Disability Data Asset, and it serves a really important purpose.

00:28:45:00 - 00:29:13:11

It will allow governments and others to better support people with disability, their carers and the community will continue to prioritize support for building the National Disability Data Asset and providing access to the asset and targeting other new use cases and providing a concierge service for organizations to make their first and repeat data requests. We're learning a lot adapting and improving our tools and approach as we go.

00:29:13:12 - 00:29:40:08

We had our first annual data forum or annual Forum for data Scheme participants in June to get feedback on our performance and learn more about their priorities. Their top priority was making it easier to share data for example, through better integration and linkage with data, place of data, place with agency specific systems. So, if you're getting a request, I encourage you to use data place and respond to that request.

00:29:40:08 - 00:30:05:00

Through that, I caution you against emailing the person and saying, Could you please withdraw that request and send me an email to this address? That's not what asking participants are looking for. They're looking for a one stop shop. They're looking for it to happen in a timely way, and they're looking for an efficient and an easy way to access the data.

00:30:05:01 - 00:30:31:13

The second thing people have raised with us is greater recognition by Australian government agencies of accreditation status. So, if you're receiving a request, we want you to acknowledge that that entity is accredited and don't ask them the same question that we've asked them. We've given them the tick of approval to say they've got the data systems, they've got the data management and governance capability, they've got the people capability.

00:30:31:14 - 00:31:02:03

You will still have to ask them some questions to complete your data sharing agreement and around the five safes or the data sharing principles. But you need to start acknowledging start by acknowledging that they're already accredited. So that's an important thing. Now, in the spirit of international access to ensure that information. Day, let me close off with a few calls to action and giving you our contact details.

00:31:02:05 - 00:31:23:10

If you're not yet onboarded and if you don't yet have a complete and up to date inventory of data, assets make it a priority to get one and link it to the Australian Government data catalogue. We're here to support you on that and we've got guidance available for you on that if you're not yet on board. It's a data place.

00:31:23:13 - 00:31:58:04

Get on board and start using it to manage the requests, but also use it as your system to manage your data sharing if you're not yet. I showed you the entities of accredited entities, the list of accredited entities. If you're not yet accredited as a data user, start your application. And that way you can also gain access to information and data you haven't been able to before and use that data to your organization's entity at your organization's mission.

00:31:58:05 - 00:32:20:08

If you yet to make a data sharing request using data, please make one get in contact with us. We're here to help you do all of that. And my final request for you is to is to share with us how you're using data to deliver value for our system, for our citizens, better government policies, programs and services, as well as research outcomes.

00:32:20:09 - 00:32:46:09

Your stories are important. Help Australians understand how we're using their data to deliver better outcomes for them and build their trust and confidence in us. So, we're keen to hear your stories and keen to hear about the good work you're doing. I'll also mention that we have the APS Awards dinner that awards dinner coming up and the Australian Government Data Forum on the 13th and the 14th of November.

00:32:46:11 - 00:33:28:07

So, I want you to get your tickets for that and join us to support and celebrate data innovation and excellence in the APS. Thank you.

Australian Information Commissioner Elizabeth Tydd

Thank you, Gayle. I don't think we could have asked for a better introducer introduction to the concept that we work within an ecosystem of Information access. There's no exclusive single statute that governs providing access to information whilst we have the FOI legislation, we have administrative schemes, we have other shared schemes.

00:33:28:08 - 00:34:13:00

Those schemes operate according to a couple of principles that you're all incredibly familiar with, and they are timeliness and robust decision making. And I think we heard about that today, which is wonderful to see those themes that have been traditionally under an access to information statute manifest. As we build access to information throughout our government activities. I think you also hopefully highlighted straight back to the FOI Act, Section three, and the importance of treating this information as a national resource and using it for the public interest and advancing our ability to better serve the Australian community.

00:34:13:01 - 00:34:44:03

Now, I was incredibly impressed if we move to our next speaker, much the same after our first speaker. But when I came to this role and met with Chris and saw the work that his agency has done in terms of the protections that apply to us as we outsource some of our social services and engagement for the provision of services with third party providers and non-government providers.

00:34:44:04 - 00:35:06:05

The sorts of advocacy I was doing in my former role in New South Wales are actually all built into the work that Chris has done to protect people. Looking at the notion of where information is held, who's had access to that information internally by way of audit logs, but also externally. How do we allow citizens to access that information?

00:35:06:06 - 00:35:26:13

How does government retain its ability to control something that it is engaged with third party providers for? So, I want to share that reassurance with you and many other things in Chris presentation. Thank you.

Chief Executive Officer Digital Transformation Agency Chris Fechner

00:35:26:14 - 00:35:56:05

Thank you. It's a great privilege to be here today so as Liz talked about, I'm a very long-term digital person and a long-term government person. One of the great things about combining the two is, is that digital is a mechanism to advance government and advance society, and it accelerates in a lot of ways. So, I'm going to start with a little bit about FOI and the context it relates to us.

00:35:56:07 - 00:36:21:11

So, the DTA does work across a number of things. Strategy, policy, architecture, sourcing and assurance, and it's talked about our role in procurement. So very much of the government is underpinned by digital and very much of the government's digital is underpinned by third parties doing work. One of the things that we actually do is help with the transparency.

00:36:21:11 - 00:36:48:04

So, we spend about 10% of our budget around the digital space and we spend long term about $2 billion every on investments in those particular things. It has a really big impact on policy delivery, service delivery and internal capabilities of government. So, I understand how we use information and how it's available to people goes pretty much with the aspects of the race and for Ally.

00:36:48:06 - 00:37:21:03

So how do we advance policy, how do we advance service delivery and how do we actually keep those aspects about people participating with the government? So, I've just come back from an open government forum overseas, and one of the things that really came through there is, is that governments that engage digitally and can engage effectively digitally have got a high degree of participation with their citizens, and that contributes to a stronger and more participatory democracy.

00:37:21:05 - 00:37:50:05

So, one of the things that we really admire about these particular things is the Information publications game, and that's about the proactive, the planned release of how information gets out into the community. And certainly, I think I come from a background of states and territories as the Commonwealth. The states have got a very strong view about proactive release, about information, and many, many governments have got the requirement to really push towards it.

00:37:50:07 - 00:38:16:15

And you heard from Gayle and Liz about the Commonwealth's obligations and those particular things. So, we have things like the data and digital government strategy which I mentioned. We have things like the data procurement catalogues. We also have. And one of the things I'm going to talk about today is the concept of the starting to deploy artificial intelligence across the government for the purposes of doing many of those things.

00:38:16:15 - 00:38:49:04

I talked about improving service delivery and improving government capabilities internally, but also creating policy and doing things like that. So, at the overlap that I'm really going to talk about is with AI, I especially generative AIS pushed us really quickly into understanding those of digital, which we've kind of been able to go slow with before. And Australians have a very high expectation that I will actually enhance outcomes for them into sight.

00:38:49:05 - 00:39:14:14

They have a very low trust of government using AI for the betterment of the society. So, there is also a lot of fear around government agencies using artificial intelligence in their own roles, and that's been exacerbated by things like the data matching exercises around RoboDebt, which has put a bit of an institutional stain on the Commonwealth in that way.

00:39:14:15 - 00:39:41:06

But what we've also got is really rapidly emerging capabilities. When the first AI strategy was considered that started that data and digital strategy, then when I first came to the Commonwealth, I was a data science function that was not a general public capability. So, this rapid emergence has also led us to a point where we can't necessarily easily keep up with that.

00:39:41:07 - 00:40:31:05

And when we can't keep up with it, the trust and confidence of the citizens and businesses of Australia that we're using, it can be eroded. So part of what we're looking at doing is understanding how with declarations like the Australian ethics, that we are able to build trust and confidence and building trust and confidence in the context of AI is largely about providing that information about what we're doing, how we're doing it, and where we're using it very publicly, making it proactively position so that we understand how it's working, that we understand how people can consider whether they like that use case or not, how it's been assessed in terms of trustworthiness, accuracy, risk, but also, how people can engage. Going back to that thing about participatory democracy, how they can engage if they want us to do things, so they don't want us to do things. And this goes very much to the point of government's purpose is to improve the amenity of society. It's also to be accountable to society. So, the way that we considering AI is in the context of FOI and in the context that we want to ensure that we're producing the best outcomes that we can for people and for businesses in Australia.

00:41:06:11 - 00:41:30:02

So, the policy that I wanted to talk about today is the for the responsible use of AI in inside of government. Now there is broader impacts like you may have heard about the voluntary code of AI safety that Department of Industry, Science and Resources has put out at our policies fit within the constraints of the broader economy policies.

00:41:30:03 - 00:41:50:11

But one of the things I want to talk about this is something that's been going on for about a year and a half now on the basis that we've been working with states and territories to make sure that we've got consistent expectations and disclosures about how we're going to use artificial intelligence for the purposes of government at states, territories and Commonwealth.

00:41:50:12 - 00:42:20:15

But this is specifically the Commonwealth approach to this, and it applies to all Commonwealth corporate entities came into effect, I think, on the 1st of September. And the couple of things that I'm going to talk about, some of the first standards that come out and they really go to that to the heart of why we want to be able to just to allow the Commonwealth to take the great advantage of artificial intelligence.

00:42:21:00 - 00:42:44:05

There would not be a person in the room who is not engaged with a large language model and used it in some way. There would not be one person in this room who has not been the subject or the or the output of something that has gone through an AI instance, that there will be people, whether that's a representation or a group or anything like that.

00:42:44:07 - 00:43:11:01

So, it is applying to everybody and it's applying more and more, and it has a really large impact on the way that government's going to act in the future. It goes from the concept of how do we use data that we put into it to potentially train models; How do we actually ensure that models the way we expect them to by putting in safety controls about what they can actually do?

00:43:11:02 - 00:43:26:01

And how do we actually look at the inferences, the outcomes of some of these things and how they impact on people and whether they can actually transparently be understood as to how they came to that particular app.

00:43:26:02 - 00:44:01:02

We also need to make sure that as we build, we start to build in a way that grows over time. So, we think about how do we start with the lower the lower risk use cases and build up in those spaces? How do we look at the emerging technology? Remember November 21 was the first instance, and if you go back to 1998, I think was at the launch of Google, I think 2008 was the launch of the App Store on iPhone.

00:44:01:03 - 00:44:26:08

And if you look at the difference between 2022 and 2024, in terms of the advancements of the generative I, I would say it's quite revolutionary by comparison to how do we actually pick it up and use it in a way that actually gives the government gives the people confidence that we're using it effectively, but it also gives us internally confidence that we are using it effectively.

00:44:26:10 - 00:44:52:00

So, there are some policy expectations. And the one that I've highlighted there is transparency of application by agencies, and I'll talk more about that. But we've also called out accountability. So, these are publicly available statements within 90 days of the policy starting, every agency in the Commonwealth got an obligation to show who their accountable officials are for the application of AI within their entity.

00:44:52:02 - 00:45:17:15

That can be an individual, it can be a group. It's not necessarily your IT boffin, it's not necessarily your record person, it's not necessarily your risk officer. It's for agencies to consider the context of the standard and make a decision as to who is the most appropriate person to do that or group of people to do that. It's also incredibly important that we give information about people ready for it.

00:45:17:15 - 00:45:49:13

So, the data is also working on some minimum training capabilities that explain the difference between decision systems, which are rules based, and they have fixed outcomes versus artificial intelligence systems, which are probabilistic and have got a likelihood of outcomes. And understanding the discrete difference between those things. You'll have seen instances where people talk about anything that works on a rules-based system can be considered to be in the broadest context.

00:45:49:13 - 00:46:18:05

That's true. But what we're really talking about here is where the path to the outcome is not directly fixed. It's done as a system of probability. So, people need to know that if you ask copilot, did anyone participate in the copilot? TRUMP Yes. Did it change your lives or not? No. So the question about that is, is if we're using these things, how do we actually know whether we can trust or not?

00:46:18:06 - 00:46:55:00

Because anybody who's worked in the sector has used something like copilot, has clearly seen the outcomes of hallucinations, has clearly seen the outcomes of misinterpretations. And we have to actually start to get to that understanding that when you are a accountable official or a person or public servant who is using AI for the purposes of extending or enhancing or augmenting your work, there is a need for you to understand the outcome that you're actually committing to from those things.

00:46:55:02 - 00:47:25:13

It's like the early days of introduction of new technologies for systems. One of the ways that you actually test new systems is by checking that the outcomes are the same in the manual processes. It is with the systematic process, and we're actually helping a little bit with a mechanism for people to understand risk, understand the application of AI through the Commonwealth II assurance framework, which will be piloted in some agencies over the next six months before it goes into policy positions.

00:47:25:14 - 00:47:48:10

Now this is not made pretending that I can do string art. This is actually an understanding of how we're actually going to make clear to people how we're using AI in the Commonwealth. So, we're talking about on the left-hand side here, the AUC in my left, sorry, not yours, your left-hand side is about where we're going to apply it.

00:47:48:10 - 00:48:16:14

So, people don't care too much about using AI in workplace productivity, for instance. But when you actually make decision making and administrative action and you make it apply to service delivery people a lot, and the way that we're actually looking at that. So, image processing for scientific purposes, CSIRO does a really good job of finding stars in space or black holes in space simply by looking for anomalies in images.

00:48:16:15 - 00:48:39:00

That one's going to get particularly frightened about that application to maybe the Martians who don't want to do that. But other things will if we start using workplace productivity and we go into compliance and fraud detection, they start looking at logs for when people go in and out of buildings and look at those on timesheets, people get really concerned about it.

00:48:39:01 - 00:49:12:07

So, the that that transparency statements that we're actually putting forward is part of the standard under the policy is all about making sure that people know how we're using it, what we're using it for in the mines, we're actually using it. And we believe that this transparency will actually give people the trust and confidence to use it. It will also put the people that are in charge of this process, give them the cautionary framework to say when they should actually take a breath and step back and consider whether they should or should not these things.

00:49:12:08 - 00:49:41:09

Now, the other one that I actually quickly wanted to touch from was about major projects. I talked about $2 billion worth of projects going through pretty much every year, and that's a lot of money that could be spent on something else. We believe very strongly in the data that digital is an enabler of better outcomes for government. And in doing so, we want to make sure that all the investments that are made in government are actually doing what they say they will do.

00:49:41:10 - 00:50:16:13

That will make the time, which will make the outcomes, which will understand the expense for them. And what we've actually set up and this goes towards transparency about are we making the right investment decisions, Do the public understand where we're actually making investment decisions and how those investment decisions, realizing the benefits that we say that we are and how we do it in February last year, this year, so not last year, I'm really into next year, February this year, we actually released the first of the transparency reports for the major projects inside of the Commonwealth.

00:50:16:14 - 00:50:40:03

It's on the data's website and I would actually encourage people to go and have a look at that, as is the AI policy on digital. Dasgupta Review. What I would actually say to people is, is that we spend a lot, and we are sometimes not quite as transparent as we need to be in the use and application of digital technology.

00:50:40:07 - 00:51:06:05

Now one of the things that focusing on not being transparent about that is it increases distrust of future investments in digital. And I say if we don't invest in digital life safety, we will simply not be able to keep up with the explosion of information, the explosion of demand, access to services, the explosion in demand for access to information resources across the Commonwealth.

00:51:06:06 - 00:51:32:05

So, for us to be successful, for us to fulfill our role, fulfill our role as improving the amenity of society and being accountable to society, things like this are very important for us to drive the light into what is often considered to be a fairly dark art. So, the art of digital and I see take the expense category of digital and I see tape.

00:51:32:07 - 00:51:55:13

Whereas if we look at the 21st century, there won't be anybody whose role is underpinned by digital. And there was a very clever statement that was talking about the impact of AI in the workforce. People are very concerned about that. But one of the things that came out from a lot of the research, and it goes right back to the Industrial revolution, they always think that jobs are going to be reduced.

00:51:55:14 - 00:52:17:02

That transforms they're uplifted, they're changed, and I think it's going to be no different in that. But we have to be very conscious about it. So, one of the statements that's come out is, is now nobody that's in a role is going to be replaced explicitly by AI. They may be replaced by somebody who knows that role and knows AI.

00:52:17:03 - 00:52:46:09

So, what we need to do is make sure that we embrace the opportunities of these things and manage the risks associated with them. So, these things like transparency dashboards, we have a transparency report around all about procurement inside the data. Let's talk about that. And I wanted to make that we've got lots of things that people could go and see that create trust in using data and digital across the economy, because if we embrace it, we take it up.

00:52:46:11 - 00:53:10:12

We're going to be able to deliver much more and support democracy, much more. You may have seen recently, and I'm just about to close United Spain recently the introduction of legislation for the removal of deep fakes across it. These are the sort of things that government needs to be in front of. And if we're not engaged heavily in this particular space, then we are not in a good position to set policy on this.

00:53:10:14 - 00:53:20:11

We're not in a good position to create systems that support the management of the controls that we want to put in place. So, you can go and look at that. And that is me – thank you.

Australian Information Commissioner Elizabeth Tydd

00:53:27:11 - 00:53:55:10

That was an incredibly rich presentation. It brought home for me those cornerstones of transparency and accountability and how in this new frontier, we embed that in our systems I just want to touch on an issue that Chris raised around the use of AI or machine enhanced decision making. We're in a position where we can look to Europe, we can look around the globe about how those laws have developed.

00:53:55:11 - 00:54:17:02

One that I find really interesting in the FOI context is the French Digital Republic law, which says there are three requirements whenever you're using machine enhanced decision making, and that is as a government entity, and that is to tell people you're using it to provide a general explanation of how that in how it's being used and upon request.

00:54:17:02 - 00:54:42:13

So I think if I want a more detailed explanation of how it's being used, and I think those features embed the right of access to information in this new frontier, it's very important to look at that because if we think about what we do every day, particularly in administrative decision making, administrative decision making is based on the or challenging a decision.

00:54:42:13 - 00:55:06:08

A particular decision of government is based on the notion that you will be able to point to era. How do you do that? We are using multiple data sets to inform our decision making and who owns that data set, and which one is it and how has it created potentially the bias, the hallucinating effect that we see in some of the outcomes of these decisions?

00:55:06:09 - 00:55:37:00

So, it's fascinating to be in this space of I want access to information, transparency and accountability and advancing that compact between governments and the citizens they serve. As we embark on this new frontier. Another person, Amanda, who is about to join us, will pick up on another really crucial part. The information that government holds about the citizens it serves, and that you are custodians of, that you are stewards of.

00:55:37:02 - 00:56:12:06

And that's sensitive health data, and that gives us the ability to gain some insights into the interface between information, access and privacy and how as practitioners and how we as people who serve the community are able to reconcile sometimes those tensions that exist, which is my great as information Commissioner, to be working with two other commissioners under a three commissioner model for the first time in some time, and to be able to explore this and better serve you and your needs as we advance these agendas.

Amanda Cattermole PSM, Chief Executive Officer, Australian Digital Health Agency

00:56:12:07 - 00:56:47:03

Thank you so much for that, Elizabeth and that absolute perfect intro to exactly where I was going to go. And I'd like to start by acknowledging the honourable people was so privileged to have the kind of welcome to country that we have from senior elders like Violet and remind ourselves as we stand here together, the great privilege of standing in more than 60,000 years of, history and custodianship.

00:56:47:03 - 00:57:15:00

And to all those online in all the remarkable parts of Australia that you're in and that custodianship that is shared right across? Australia One of the things that I absolutely love about coming to have these conversations together, as well as the sharing and engagement we'll have together shortly, is listening to colleagues and realizing just how many more synergies, opportunities, inflection points that there are together.

00:57:15:00 - 00:57:45:03

This is a remarkable time to be engaged in talking about thinking about information sharing and as you said, Elizabeth, that the challenges, the intersections and the complexity, that it is absolutely our obligation to navigate through together for the purposes that we are so privileged to have working in government, and that is to ensure that we're supporting Australians and improving their lives many ways.

00:57:45:03 - 00:58:09:14

And the one that I want to touch on, as Elizabeth said, is around health. But as you hear that there are obviously areas that apply to all of the areas that you work in as well. And the issues that we're facing are faced right across government in a whole range of ways. When I have a chat, I often would like to start with this quote, thinking about what is it that we're talking about here?

00:58:09:14 - 00:58:33:02

And Minister Butler, I think, coined it beautifully by talking about digital as the single greatest opportunity to transform health care. And the reason it's great is that one of the things that it does really fully that I think is part of this world that we're in right now is thinking about digital innovation as an enabler for policy reform, and in this case, the reform of the health system.

00:58:33:03 - 00:59:13:04

And that's been given life to in a range of ways at the moment, including the strengthening Medicare agenda. And I just think I just want to touch on what that agenda looks like for a minute. For those who are less familiar with this part of government policy work right now, it is deeply about bringing Australians fully into the centre of their own health care journeys, which sounds obvious, but really critical that you think about the system so that Australians are absolutely the architects of their own health care journeys and that their teams are connected around them, providing holistic care in a multidisciplinary team environment, having the information they need.

00:59:13:04 - 00:59:38:06

And that's where we'll pick up the story here together today to provide the best quality care. Having that together, knowing the whole person and being able to share information together for the purposes of that person's better health. And as we do this, it's really, it's been quite an interesting journey because this has really been an inflection point, the sense that digital innovation is an enabler for this policy reform agenda.

00:59:38:07 - 01:00:09:12

And there's a range of ways in which it is, I think, unprecedented in the way this is happening in Australia. One of them is this this sense of this baked into the policy environment. The second is the extraordinary collaboration that is going on across the states and territories in the Commonwealth, across industries that support health care and right through the health care system as well as and I'll touch on this a bit more in a minute because again, it goes to today what it is that Australians want and what they're expecting of their health care system.

01:00:09:13 - 01:00:29:14

And a few things have really become into stark relief as we've sort of elevated and this health reform agenda in this new way. And one of them is that we've got a bunch of things in place that actually turn out to be critical cornerstones if we're going to go on this journey in a way that is going to support Australians.

01:00:30:02 - 01:00:52:15

But as Elizabeth said, make sure that we sit properly nested within the challenges of information sharing, but supporting privacy and security and maintaining the trust of Australians in their systems. And as it turns out, and I'm going to talk a bit about my health record as, as some of you will know, part of my agency's role is to steward the My Health Record System on behalf of Australians.

01:00:52:15 - 01:01:24:04

But one of the things that is interesting that's become really clear is some of the things that were baked into the legislation, baked into the philosophical underpinnings of the system, have turned out to be absolutely as we go on this really unprecedented journey. And I want to I want to sort of look at them not just because my health record matters in this conversation, because we're talking about information, about your information and about how we support sharing of information in a safe way.

01:01:24:06 - 01:01:50:11

But because this is an increasingly complicated environment. We want to make sure that we continue to maintain the right settings and the trust that they engender. So, I want to touch on a few of them because they've really become the cornerstones of the way in which we are sort of being able to go forward in this agenda. So firstly, I'll touch on them slightly differently to the way they are here, but this just gives you a sort of a bit of a visual overview.

01:01:50:12 - 01:02:18:02

So first one is if you look at, I take my health record as a cornerstone for consumer-based health information. So the ability for you to have at your fingertips your own health information, it operates under own legislation that is really critical that we set up that way so that you have a system in place, a framework, a set of underpinnings for that set that were designed, have a clear set of roles and responsibilities of which ours is a significant one.

01:02:18:02 - 01:02:48:05

But there are a range of others, including Elizabeth and others, making sure there are safeguards, that there is registration of those who operate in the system, including all the health care providers and so on who work in it. And it's designed to make that information is accessible so long as it's authorized by the record holder and that it also very in a flip but really critical one is protected from unauthorized use and access and breaches.

01:02:48:05 - 01:03:16:13

And that means that we together, you make all of us can choose to share our health information we with whom we want and on the basis that we want to. And the act also establishes a privacy framework. So, in addition to our obligations under the Privacy Act, establishes its own one, which specifies in a very deep way with significant penalties collection, use disclosure and so on to make sure that there is that protection.

01:03:16:13 - 01:03:50:10

So, finding the balance in a complex information sharing environment with those protections and they set an even higher Bar and Privacy Act, we comply, of course, with both schemes and support information, provide reporting and information under schemes. But again, to make sure we engender that trust, that protection that then enables information sharing. The Act has its own data breach regime as well that supports compliance and with particular roles for the Australian Promotion Commissioner.

01:03:50:11 - 01:04:13:12

Secondly, and really critically in this, in this scheme, consent is key, and this has turned out to be absolutely vital as we go on a journey about Australians as the absolute architects, their own health information. So, it's a consumer-controlled health record, your record, and that means you choose who to share it with, on what basis you share it, and that can be turned on and off at any time.

01:04:13:14 - 01:04:36:06

And that was how it was set up at the beginning. That philosophical underpinning was baked into the way this was conceived of. And really interestingly, as we talk to people around the world, because this is really a global enterprise at the moment, an information sharing agenda in health and many other areas, but really strongly health. There are a lot of countries done all sorts of great things that we're learning all the time.

01:04:36:06 - 01:05:00:00

But one thing a number of them have said is having like DNA consent-based model upfront is absolutely the key. And that hasn't happened in every place because these things have happened organically. So, it's really interesting when you reflect back on the beginnings, what things of begin as the critical cornerstones and as we are in this new policy environment which is going to amplify sharing.

01:05:00:00 - 01:05:28:09

I'll get to that in a second. The notion of a consent system becomes one of the absolutely critical bulwarks in in that environment, and that is one in which we are going to move from a what I call nice to have regime for information sharing into my health record to a share by default agenda. So, picking up that side by default kind of a philosophy that is also starting is coming through in a whole range of otherwise.

01:05:28:09 - 01:05:50:00

Now in the health environment that is starting with pathology and diagnostic, which is where government is going to start with the share by default agenda. And the idea is that it moves through so clinicians will no longer be just nice to have. Could you pop that in? It will be by default, that information will go in and the more it is there, the more you've got it available to you and so on.

01:05:50:01 - 01:06:10:04

And so that's really critical when you think about being how to use the system for in a whole range of otherwise. And we'll talk about the other use of data. So, the broader kind of disaggregated de-identified data in a minute. Secondly, it's based on consumer choice. So again, that notion, it is up to us as Australians who and how we want to share with.

01:06:10:05 - 01:06:38:05

There are also prohibitions the act, so really clear prohibitions that make sure that there's things that you absolutely can't share in relation to including insurance and employment matters really policy reasons. But that was really critical to when Australians were having this debate about an information system that is ours, about our health. Those concerns absolutely at the forefront and reflected really strongly in the way that the act was created.

01:06:38:05 - 01:07:04:14

And then on the flipside, a range of provisions about when we as an agency might be required to share information. And again, you can see the dichotomies and the challenges that are faced there. And they're very limited, they're very prescribed. And of course they include things like courts, tribunals, coroners, and more and more interestingly, in the sense of there's more in emergency situations.

01:07:05:02 - 01:07:29:00

So, there was always an understanding of they may need in an in an emergency, a clinician's ability, access, information that I might not have said in my normal circumstances I want them to access. You can see the challenges that that part brings and how we support that, while also absolutely holding true to the consent model that underlies the legislation.

01:07:29:01 - 01:07:50:11

And that's been subject to joint work over a long period of time with the states and territories, with the with the Elizabeth and the team, and just making sure that we can find that right balance and articulate that in a way that will maintain the trust but support the clinical safety of Australians in those moments. And that's a couple of other things that matter to.

01:07:50:14 - 01:08:12:00

One of them is the Health Care identifier service. It sits alongside the record and that's there to make sure that we know who you are. And every clinician in Australia and who they are in the system uniquely and with authority, because of course it matters that we know who everyone is, we know what authorizations they have and do not have to access that information.

01:08:12:00 - 01:08:34:10

And we know that you are you. And so that's a really critical underpinning as well. And so, as we think about this, as data and information become more central to the system, more central to the support for the policy change environment, it is absolutely critical that this is sits at the heart of it. And this is in terms of our role at the agency.

01:08:34:14 - 01:09:05:07

This law is at the very heart of who we are and what we do. But interestingly, although the My health record is really a critical product, if you like, of service, for us, the information sharing agenda is growing and changing all the time. So, for example, we now steward the real time prescription monitoring service for Australia, and that is a national harmonized service now designed to support prescription monitoring, to know that to be out of support medications, safety in Australia.

01:09:05:09 - 01:09:28:02

We have an app for those who have an engage with my health app, yet I commend it to you and also other products like Provider Connect Australia, which is designed to be able to have a source of truth in real time around practices and around information and directories about who clinicians are in the system because there is such an enormous amount of work and rework that goes on with, with clinicians.

01:09:28:02 - 01:10:02:09

If you know, for example, a doctor moves practices the amount of times that they have to tell different directories, different services, different organizations I engage with. The idea is to be able to provide, again, central repositories for that information and brokerage services that can share that out in real time. And so if you think about all of that, this is a really critical to make sure that we have fully central those key elements that have already been touched on transparency, accountability, our stewardship role, having the dialog that should have with Australians about how this works and what it is they expect.

01:10:02:10 - 01:10:28:09

I want to touch on just a couple of others like Chris. I want to I want to have a look at it for a while too, because you think again, we have my health record and a whole set of obligations about sharing and protection in the way I've described. We also have as an agency our obligations to be transparent to engage deeply in the regimes for access to information so that there is that trust, so that we are proactively engaged in information sharing.

01:10:28:10 - 01:10:53:00

And we've gone on a journey like so many have around making sure that we uplift and deeply lean into our work and role in as to enable FOI request as well as Chris. Chris touched on our information publication scheme, where we go more proactively even to identify and publish information in really critical for people to see key elements of our information.

01:10:53:00 - 01:11:21:07

And what you can see here is that in terms of what people are asking about, a lot of our FOI requests are about my health record. That is, it's about their own access to their own information. And so how we engage on that really matters because it goes back then directly to that other role in ensuring that we support people in their engagement with their own record, their digital health literacy, because we need to be able to support that.

01:11:21:07 - 01:11:43:12

So, people, when they do have that information, can really engage deeply with it. And then of course then to support the foundational aspects of the system itself. And that really matters too, in an environment we currently have where we can't compel clinicians to upload that information. Now we will get there. That's where we're going. But right now, that isn't the case.

01:11:43:12 - 01:12:12:00

So, we need to talk to Australians about encouraging the practitioners to upload as we go on that journey, to start to move to a share by default agenda. And as I said, that is going to make it a requirement, starting with pathology and diagnostic imaging, and that will really enable this environment to more fully grow on itself. So, the more information that's the more it's useful, the more Australians demand it because it's there and it is helpful, the more it goes in and so on.

01:12:12:00 - 01:12:33:06

And this really starts to get that virtuous circle, which was what was envisaged all along. And it really and what's really interesting is over the last few years this has grown already and what we're seeing now is even with this signalling of a changed policy environment, it's growing on itself. So, the signalling itself starts to change the dynamic.

01:12:33:10 - 01:12:59:05

You can see there, there the stats around different parts of the health system registered with. And using my health record, you can see it pretty strong on GP pharmacies and public hospitals roll back a few years. Other parts of the system, like specialists and aged care providers, very, really low engagement and that has lifted substantially Now some of that is work that we do with those parts of the health system.

01:12:59:07 - 01:13:26:10

Some of it, for example, is part of our role in the response to the Aged Care Royal Commission. But it is growing on itself, and they engage. And the more that happens, the more that network effect means that the information is available across a person's health journey. We're also seeing uplift all round. So, you can see there just a little bit of a snapshot more than it's now 24 million.

01:13:26:11 - 01:14:02:01

It grows all the time. We've got 1.2 billion documents. So, we're talking about really extraordinary numbers of data holdings. They are put in by consumers and health care providers because, of course, you can put in your own information and really interestingly, we have just a touch on our engagement with First Nations organizations, the communities, large number of communities, Aboriginal community-controlled health organizations who input local information about the traditional medicines that people are using.

01:14:02:01 - 01:14:26:01

So, when their doctor engages with them, they have a holistic view of the different medicines, both traditional and Western medicines that First Nations people are using. So, a more holistic engagement with, with people and their health and wellbeing and the way they are supporting and managing their own health and wellbeing. And we've seen the volumes are growing.

01:14:26:01 - 01:14:56:04

You can see all of that and really interestingly growing numbers of people who check whose access, they report the really important that people go in and say, hang on, I'm not quite sure. I think that's right. And of course, they can then engage with us on checking and testing. They're also or people are asking and demanding. So, in exactly the same way that you've heard from Chris and Gail, people are this is a revolution in, what people expect from their health system and their own health information.

01:14:56:05 - 01:15:21:01

They don't want to have to retell their stories. They don't understand why it is. I did a test last week. Someone's telling me I have to have it again. I'm pretty sure I've already done that. They don't want they want to be able to engage with their doctors about their whole person knowing what it is. You know, all elements of the work they're doing that really matters, particularly for people, for example, with chronic conditions and older Australians and so on, and share by default.

01:15:21:01 - 01:15:43:10

So, as I said this, this will be the policy change that really lights up this ability for us to have the information that we need at our fingertips. And it really is kind of a lightning rod, I think, then for responding to that demand, having the information available and growing it on itself. And it's really critical to for medication safety.

01:15:43:10 - 01:16:00:07

So, at the moment, often it's really hard for people to remember. You go to the doctor, So what are you on? You know, it's the pink one. I think it's this the ability to have right in front of you all those medications, both current and previous, and have all of that available and have it in transit of care.

01:16:00:07 - 01:16:23:07

So, I'm going from my GP. I've got a hospital available right there for me so that when I'm walking into it or coming into it, that information is also available there. So, it really makes an appreciable difference. And if we start to think so, so what we start to think about here is the ability to have all this information and then to have it in near real time.

01:16:23:09 - 01:16:55:12

So, this is quite different. If you think about the beginnings of this, we have a sort of fairly strongly PDF based health information, how we need to move obviously beyond that into something that can imbibe information more quickly in a really standardized way. So, the point this was making about some information, you'd need it to be standardized. It has to be rules based, has to be understood in the same way across system, and it has to be able to be available in a much more dynamic way into the health information exchange.

01:16:55:12 - 01:17:29:05

So this is if you start to think about what's beyond this, I've talked a little bit about the consumer facing part of the system, but what about the information that's needed to be shared across the health system of which in and out of you and me is a part of, but also clinicians engaging with each other. And this is the medium term goal where you think, if you like, in my terms a kind of network of networks where you've got information, as I said, my health record as our as our sort of consumer facing hub but information passing around the system where it is needed.

01:17:29:07 - 01:17:55:07

And in that environment, it's really critical that the settings are all as they need to be. The regulatory environment, the legislative settings, the consent-based model, who owns what's understood, who's authorized, who is identified. Every single one of those pieces’ matters. And that needs to happen at a national level. So that requires significant collaboration between the states and territories and the Commonwealth.

01:17:55:07 - 01:18:33:13

And that work is underway under an intergovernmental agreement on digital health for which the architecture, if you like, is agreed. And the first piece of work to be done under that, which is National Provider Directory, so that all of that is understood together is, is agreed and the work in that is underway. But all of this, there's an enormous body of work that is a medium term goal because the harmonization in the legislative and policy settings that are needed, a really critical right across the nation and if we again just want to go deeply into I've done much better job than I could, but just if you think about the things that Chris posed in the possibilities of AI and, other data driven technologies, you got to have an abundance of high quality data. So, you have to have all of this framed in a high quality, clearly understood way shared in a in a consistent manner, to be able to harness it, to be able to use it in that kind of way. And so, it's critical that all of this work and all of the work that we call interoperability, the things that the data sharing standards that underpin all of this is done really deeply.

01:19:05:06 - 01:19:32:09

And to support those capabilities. So, when they're in the information, there is trusted, consistent and shared and understood and these are clinical systems. So, this is it's absolutely important that it is clinically appropriate. This is your health. This is my health. The health of everybody that we care about. And so, we need to make sure that this is a safe and trusted environment.

01:19:32:10 - 01:19:56:04

And that's why we're part of that whole of government effort that Chris spoke about really critically. To think about which bit of that do we need to engage with? What does it mean for the health care system as we look at that entire whole of governments? White And as we do that, it's this it's this real dichotomy between an environment that is going to have more sharing and the protections that are needed for the trust to be maintained in that system.

01:19:56:08 - 01:20:19:08

And things like the Medisecure event recently and others we all know about challenge the trust and how we continue to have the conversation we need to have it really debate the balanced priorities to make sure that we can do this in the right possible way. And last thing for me is, just this is when we think about this, we're talking about your information at a personal level.

01:20:19:10 - 01:20:53:15

You also think about the possibilities of this with AI tools and so on to kind of amplify it all using de-identified data at a population level. So, you can have not only everything we know about you available at the moment, you need it, but also opportunity for the best of population health, the best of research. That is another domain that is absolutely critical here and that we get right now at the moment, the way that my health record was set up was designed for that not to be the case early on, but there were frameworks put in place that have to enable that conversation to begin

01:20:54:01 - 01:21:13:02

And there's a whole lot of legislative and technical work that would be needed for that to come to life. But it is absolutely the next conversation that we need to have together. How would we do that too? And to be able to share insights, you know, your demography, you know, over people's life journeys, different parts of Australia. And so on.

01:21:13:02 - 01:21:32:06

And the opportunities for this in a network of networks are huge. We have to get them right and there's an enormous amount to do. We're doing that work with the Department of Health and Aged Care, the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, who are the data custodians for the possible secondary use framework in really thinking about how you would stage that.

01:21:32:07 - 01:22:04:02

It requires a pretty careful, pretty staged plan, but also a really big national conversation. And so if you think about all of this, it becomes more complex, more critical that we can engage really deeply and hold the trust, hold the protections while we also go on a journey to share the information that is yours, that is going to provide support your clinicians with to support your better health care, cyber and the cyber security elements of that are obviously an absolutely critical part of this work.

01:22:04:02 - 01:22:33:02

So, I'll stop there too. But suffice to say, this is an incredible time to be having these conversations about sharing, about security, about trust. And as stewards, we all absolutely all share that deeply. We share it in our part of the world You shared in yours and how we together use these forums to have the synergies, the engagement and the testing and checking that we need to do this to really equip our role as stewards to support Australians. Thanks.

Australian Information Commissioner Elizabeth Tydd

Thank you very much, Amanda. I don't think we could have asked for a better use case to demonstrate the value of individual of access to information, but also the collective value of information and how we share and apply that information to better serve the community. Now we've run over time. It's always going to happen. We've got people who are passionate about their work.

01:23 Break for morning tea

Session 2

Assistant Commissioner FOI Rocelle Ago

01:23:04:09 - 01:23:18:11

Thank you all for coming back for part two of our session. It is my pleasure to introduce our FOI Commissioner Toni Pirani to the stage.

FOI Commissioner Toni Pirani

01:23:18:12 - 01:23:45:08

Thank you to everyone for returning after a very nice morning tea break. And I also want to just acknowledge we have; I think about 200 attendees online for this event. This so big shout out to everyone online. Normally that would be me sitting at home engaging online. But it is really nice to be here in person.

01:23:45:09 - 01:23:47:05

So, let's see if I can get the technology to work.

01:23:50:14 - 01:24:00:08

So, this morning I'm going to give you a bit of an overview. The FOI landscape and the things that I will cover are listed there on the slide.

01:24:00:09 - 01:24:03:01

I won't go through them and read them out to you, but that's of where we're going for the next half an hour and 45 minutes. So firstly, I want to talk to you about my priorities as the Freedom of Information Commissioner and I will go into this in a little bit more detail and we have fleshed them out a bit, but pretty much open is a big priority.

01:24:34:04 - 01:25:13:12

How we do our regulation at the OIC is a big part of it, uplifting the capability in agencies. FOI because our success is your success and vice versa. So, the more we can do to uplift capability, the better the entire system will be. And also looking at ways that we can make compliance easier. So, the first priority and this is becoming a bit of a familiar chart, I know starting earlier this year when this was Freedom of Information Commissioner, she embarked on a program of meeting with agency heads.

01:25:13:13 - 01:25:46:09

And this was something that she used to talk them through what our priorities are and what we're doing. I've continued that with some of the smaller agencies. So, what we've heard is we actually have quite a high level of engagement with agency heads who understand that FOI is an important legal obligation. And our view is that if your agency heads are supportive of what you're doing as FOI practitioners, it will make your job easier.

01:25:46:10 - 01:26:13:05

So, we also working FOI every day. We know that it's a really tough balancing act that you're going through to try and find reasons to release documents, to find ways for people to access their own information, to find ways for people to access the rich data that the government holds. That is a national resource for the people of Australia.

01:26:13:07 - 01:26:22:15

So, we really are looking to promote open government and participation in government decision making, which is enshrined in the FOI legislation.

01:26:25:08 - 01:27:04:03

And to ensure that information held by government is managed for public purpose and as a national resource. What we're looking to develop is a pro disclosure culture, and I think some of the feedback that we hear is maybe that's not where government has always been in relation to FOI and how we bring about that cultural shift will be really important and the mainstream aspect, which is the theme of today's presentation and the week that we're celebrating international Access to Information Day is about mainstream things.

01:27:04:04 - 01:27:34:10

So how can we foster an open by design culture so that when programs are actually being designed, they're designed in a way that makes it easier for information to be disclosed. Not that that becomes a problem that has to be addressed afterwards because it wasn't thought about it. Stop. So, a second priority is in relation to increasing the SES, FOI, regulatory and case management effectiveness.

01:27:34:11 - 01:27:57:07

And we've that's a journey that we've been on for quite a while now and we're really starting to see some results of how we have shifted our approach to our regulatory work. We would like to think that you might have seen some of those changes. So, over the last 12 months or so, we're certainly seeing the results in our casework.

01:27:57:07 - 01:28:20:00

And I will show you what some of those results are. But we have really shifted how we have dealt not just with you as agencies, but also with applicants to take a more robust regulatory posture. So, what you might have seen in past is that we would ask you to do things. And then we had a lot of other cases that we could work on.

01:28:20:00 - 01:28:38:14

So, we might not have necessarily followed you up. You didn't do it. You might not have heard any more on that case for another 12 or 18 months because we just never quite got back to it. Whereas now, hopefully what you're saying is that if we ask for something to be done, we want it to be done in time.

01:28:38:15 - 01:28:58:15

We will follow you up quite promptly if you don't it. And we also will do what we say we will do. If we say we're going to do something, we will do it. If we tell an applicant that we're going to close the matter because they haven't responded, we will do that. Whereas in the past, what might have happened is that we might have told an applicant that we were going to close their case.

01:28:59:00 - 01:29:20:00

Then we would have gone on to another case, another case, another case, and then six months later, so we might come back and go, Oh, oops, we haven't closed that case. And that's a bit rough to close at six months later. So, then we have to go and do that again. So, it's some of those streamlining by just emphasizing with our staff that if we say we're going to do something, we will do it.

01:29:20:02 - 01:29:50:05

And that is a huge benefit for us in terms of how we've been managing our caseload. Our third priority is in relation to uplifting the capability of agencies in relation to the FOI function, and today's event is part of that. As we look to engage with you, you've probably also seen our webinar series, which we've had really positive responses to.

01:29:50:07 - 01:30:20:08

So, We've also done our practitioner survey, which I will talk to a bit more detail what the outcomes of that survey has been. And so, we've really looking at ways that we can work with you to make your job easier and to make our job easier and to improve outcomes for the Australian community. And as Amanda mentioned in her presentation earlier, her work is about maintaining the trust of Australians.

01:30:20:09 - 01:30:45:05

Our work is also about maintaining the trust of Australians. I think you would all know working in this area that normally something comes to flying, not because people just want to use it for a while. Normally something else has gone wrong and something's happened and if it was seen the way of potentially solving whatever that thing is, that's gone wrong.

01:30:45:06 - 01:31:17:04

So, if we do it well, if we can release documents and give transparency and help people, then we can actually build trust not just in a flight but in the whole system of government. If we don't do that and, if we're rejecting large slabs of documents because they're irrelevant to the request or we think that there's, you know, it's not quite on point or whatever might be that can actually dilute trust in government because people don't know.

01:31:17:07 - 01:31:46:03

I know because I review your decisions that quite often what's under that black that blacked out or whited out these days this kind of often there's nothing to see here. You know, it's pretty boring, pretty mundane stuff quite often. But of course, the FOI applicant doesn't know that, and their perception is that there is obviously something really interesting to say here that they're not telling me this things.

01:31:46:03 - 01:31:53:01

So, it's being really measured in how we how we use our redactions and even in terms of how we define what documents are within scope. Anyway, moving on to the final one, priority for making FOI compliance easier, we are really looking at opportunities that we can use to make your compliance easier and to promote a low cost, high impact of practices. So, some of these measures are things like the Information Publications scheme where we have recently reviewed that scheme.

01:32:31:02 - 01:33:03:04

I will go into a bit more detail later about exactly what we found, but promoting open disclosure of documents and doing that early can actually make it easier down the track because people don't have to ask for that information. As we heard earlier from our panel this morning, there's some incredible initiatives going on across government to really promote access data to, you know, consolidate our approach to how we use AI.

01:33:03:05 - 01:33:43:14

So just tapping into those as well. Okay. Now I want to share with you and this slide makes me very happy. It's going to make me even happier; I hope by this time next year. This is the history of ICI reviews received and decided by the OIC since we began back in 2010. Now, I first came to work at the OIC in 2012 and the reason I came to work in the OIC then was because we had a backlog of ICC reviews.

01:33:43:15 - 01:34:25:00

So, you see 2012, the backlog down there, not really a backlog relatively. We have finally in the last financial year seen a leveling off. So, you say that the dotted line is almost a horizontal line between 2023 and 2024, and that shows that we are finally at a turning point of reducing our backlog. Earlier this year, we hit a high of 2273 ICC reviews on hand as of yesterday.

01:34:25:02 - 01:35:01:02

When I checked, we were down to 1807. So, we've now eaten into that backlog by round about 450 odd cases from where we are, where we were. So, we're starting to really some momentum in our work. You'll see, even though we didn't quite finalize more cases than we received last financial year, went very close and we are still seeing quite a significant number of deemed access refusals coming in as well.

01:35:01:03 - 01:35:38:00

So, if we could reduce the number of deemed access refusals coming in, we would be finalizing more matters than we are receiving. That's first like I'm really happy with this slide actually shows the percentage of ICC reviews as a proportion of all FOI requests that are made to the Commonwealth. It's still it has increased. So that's the dotted line, if you like, with the legend on the left-hand side.

01:35:38:02 - 01:36:14:11

We were, I think around about 6% when now down around 5%. That's still higher than we would like it to be. An historic claim. We've been more around 2 to 3% and I think that does tend to be borne out a bit by the volume of deemed access refusal decisions. We receive. So, anything that US agencies can do to avoid matters becoming deemed we are very grateful for so would be something to look at and look.

01:36:14:15 - 01:36:42:15

As I said, our success is your success. I appreciate that the work that we've done the last 12 months to reduce the backlog has been possible because of your engagement with those matters as agencies, and that's often the turnaround times that that we impose on keeping those matters moving can be quite tight. And because many of them are matters that are for, we're now not got too many matters over four years old.

01:36:42:15 - 01:37:02:04

But we did have matters over five years old that probably not decisions that you were even involved in at the time that probably matters that were decided by someone else. They are quite complex. They tend to get old for a reason and it has required, we know a lot of work on your part to get those matters and to keep them progressing.

01:37:02:04 - 01:37:57:02

So, thank you very much for your contribution to that. I'm going to move on to what will be appearing in our annual report in the coming weeks, which is the results of the annual statistics for agencies. So, this is an overview of how it's looked for the last decade. So from 2014 to the end of the 2023 24 financial year, as Liz mentioned earlier, overall the number of FOI requests being received by agencies has remained reasonably stable and there certainly was very little change between last year and this year in terms of the numbers that were received at about 34,000 requests across the Commonwealth.

01:37:57:03 - 01:38:31:06

Again, the timing, the proportion of matters decided within time was 74% and that has remained steady over about the last two years as well. So that's good that there are some things though, that has had been a bit concerning to us, which is that since 20 1819, the percentage of FOI requests refused in full has been steadily increasing.

01:38:31:08 - 01:38:53:06

In 20 1819 it was 13%, last year it was 23%. So that's quite a marked increase in the number of matters being refused in full. I already mentioned the percentage that have proceeded to Information Commissioner review.

01:38:53:07 - 01:38:55:11

Speaker 3

It's up from 4.8% in 2023. So, we would like agencies to have think about the way that matters are being decided, how matters are being, how you're working with applicants in relation to the scope of requests and whether there are ways. I think one of our one of our speakers this morning talked about finding reasons to release information, and I think that's probably a cultural shift that we would like to see come about.

01:39:42:10 - 01:40:16:12

So, this is just a bit of a summary slide of what we've seen in the last year. So, it was only a 1% increase in the number of FOI requests received, still really high proportion. So, 72% of all requests were access to personal information. Now, we don't know whether that is all about individuals seeking their own information or if they some of many of these are requests where.

01:40:16:12 - 01:40:48:12

People want personal information about other people. But one of the things that we would like to across agencies and we're starting to see I think our speakers this morning reflected on was more proactive ways for people to have access to their own personal information that doesn't them to go through an FOI process. We see a lot of it in, I'm sure you're familiar with what we heard about my health record this morning.

01:40:48:12 - 01:41:18:00

So these are great initiatives that are allowing people to get their own personal information. But we do see some other parts of government. And one example is Department of Home Affairs, where a lot of people seeking their own personal information have to go an FOI process in order to obtain that. We had 21% of all requests were granted in full.

01:41:18:01 - 01:42:03:12

This is a drop off from 25% in 2223. So again, we're seeing an inclination towards releasing lists. If you if you look at this data, Section 47 F is the most applied exemption, that's the exemption around personal privacy, with that being 39% of all exemption’s claims. We also see a lot of exemption claims around sections 47 Capital S, which is certain operation of agencies, Section seven say liberty of section 38 secrecy provisions and Section 37.

01:42:03:13 - 01:42:42:11

This year there were 15% fewer of practical refusal notices issued and 38% of those were subsequently processed. So that's showing a reasonable level of engagement between agencies and applicants to have those matters progress, We still see a lot of practical refusal matters and a lot of searches matters coming through to us for review, and that is in our last 12 months caseload, we're still seeing a very large proportion of those coming through.

01:42:42:12 - 01:43:20:14

74% of requests were decided in time, which was the same as 20 to 23, and we had 2004 and 81 new entries added to agency disclosure logs. So that was very similar to 2223. However, only 75% of those are actually by virtue of the direct link from your agency websites. Some agencies were aware of still requiring people to ask for access to of material.

01:43:21:00 - 01:43:55:08

We also saw a 7% decrease in internal review applications, with 55% of internal reviews affirming the original decision. I'm not going to talk a bit about the work we did last year to review the Information Publications scheme. So, 2023 was our third statutory review. We have to do this once every five years. And again, we thank you all for your engagement in that process.

01:43:55:10 - 01:44:28:14

The scheme requires agencies to publish a broad range of information and. It's a really important element of that pro disclosure culture that I was talking about earlier. So, the results show a continued commitment to the Information Publications scheme, and we have identified though that there is a lot more that could be done in relation to managing government health information.

01:44:28:15 - 01:45:01:04

So, there is more information on our website about the APS review. We're using it as a really key part of our intelligence in terms of where we need to focus our efforts as a regulatory agency. So, we will be drawing on this resource and making great deal of use of it, particularly in relation to that priority around lifting agency capability and making compliance easier.

01:45:01:05 - 01:45:49:02

So, you'll find this on our website and that really spells out the key elements of what we found in the survey. We are also, Russell, correct me if I'm wrong here, but we are in the also feeding back to you as agencies, some agency specific data on the IPA survey. So, it's good. So, this is across all of government, but we will be coming up to you individually as agencies to let you know where you as an agency are doing and where you as an agency might be able to improve.

01:45:49:03 - 01:46:22:12

So, some areas for improvement, we are looking for agencies to have an overall strategy in place to actively identify where information can be published. We are also looking at agencies and this is consistent with what some of our speakers were saying this morning about data to actually invest in asset management so that agencies have a clear idea of what information they hold and how it can be utilized.

01:46:22:13 - 01:46:57:02

Agencies should identify the connections between the information that they're publishing or disclosing through FOI and the information on their disclosure log and what could be routinely published under the information publications scheme. So, looking at ways that you can streamline, be proactive, also work with other parts of your agency to understand what is being is able to be disclosed and what kind of information.

01:46:57:02 - 01:47:51:04

Perhaps parts of your agency want to get more disclosure. We think training is emerging as a key issue. So, training for staff to understand the proactive disclosure, culture and awareness of the obligation of the IPS promoting feedback mechanisms. So, looking at ways that people can make a complaint or provide feedback. The other thing that we have found, as I mentioned earlier, is that it's quite clear that we're senior leaders in your agencies are engaged with FOI and the Information Publications scheme, that there's more likely to be proactive disclosure of information.

01:47:51:05 - 01:48:31:06

So that is the obvious survey and then move on to the FOI Practitioners survey. So, this what you told us about what your practices are and what your needs are. So, we had 147 agencies complete the survey. We found that 82% of agencies reported that the FOI guidelines were the most resource that we provide to you, with over half of agencies using our resources at least weekly.

01:48:31:07 - 01:49:34:01

So, 32% using them weekly, 14% fortnightly, and 13% monthly. And another interesting finding is that agencies with an integrated records management system and a comprehensive records management policy rated their ability to manage FOI requests more positively than agencies that did not have those tools available. So as I said in relation to the IPA survey, training came out as a really huge theme in this survey as well, it found that most agencies are using informal on the job training and internal resources, and about 40% are relying on the Australian Government's solicitor and their internal legal teams to assist them with FOI training.

01:49:34:02 - 01:50:11:03

Pleasingly, we found that 84% of agencies indicated that the staff in their agencies are subscribed to receive our icon. 84% is good. We would like it to be higher. So, if you're not, I take it if you're here you are subscribed to our icon alert. But if you're online or you know other people who ought to be subscribing would love you to promote that, we now put that out monthly and that's for us been a good guidance to make sure that we're updating you on a really regular basis.

01:50:11:05 - 01:50:59:11

Agencies found that some resources would have they would be more helpful. So, the kinds of things that you would like from us are things like fact sheets and those sorts of aides. We did ask about a learning, but they were voted least useful. So that is an interesting finding. We also asked about subject matter. And so, the top five or six five for surveys that you would like us to tell you more about, the conditional exemptions, exemptions generally decision making, procedural requirements and practical refusals.

01:50:59:12 - 01:51:36:09

So hopefully that's useful. And it's also information that we have been using to inform about how we are providing support to you. And you would have seen in recent months. We've now rolled, I think, three webinars which have been really well attended and we've been using that feedback to inform us as to what to cover in those. So, it's just a bit of a stocktake of the guidance that we do provide to you.

01:51:36:11 - 01:52:06:06

My personal favourite and from the survey, clearly yours as well, obviously guidelines which are comprehensive and as Liz mentioned, a really comprehensive tool that there's not much in there. I've now been working on. I see reviews since last May, and I think I think that's actually only been about one or two matters that have I've decided that if a change to the guidelines.

01:52:06:07 - 01:52:40:15

So, it's pretty comprehensive, everything's there. But in addition to that, we do have our practice directions, which were updated earlier this year taking effect on the 1st of July. And that practice direction is not just for you as agencies. We also have practice directions for applicants who are seeking review. At the OIC. We have a range of checklists; we have a range of templates and notices that we use.

01:52:41:00 - 01:53:13:13

There's a video, there's FOI Essentials Toolkit. So, I would commend all of those to you. This work doesn't end. We're constantly our tools and also developing new ones. So, what you can expect to see in the near future is some updates to the guidelines. We've made, some changes to the exemptions. In part five, we've made changes to the conditional exemptions in parts six.

01:53:13:14 - 01:53:15:03

We've updated Part Nine which is about internal agency review of decisions. We've also updated Part ten reflect the new practice direction and that deals with reviews by the Information Commissioner. And we've also last year we updated part 13 on the Information Publications scheme. We did go through a public consultation period when we issue new FOI guidelines, and we advise of any of those consultation process through the ICON newsletter this year.

01:53:51:06 - 01:53:56:05

We've also updated part two of the guidelines and it's quite topical. One of the changes we made to part two of the guidelines was to reflect the Federal Court's decision in the Patrick litigation about ministers matters that matter to go approval and is being held. I had sat down at 430 this afternoon for all of the of fans who might want to tune in to that. We were to issue some further materials on minister’s documents, but they are with me for clearance and so that's where they're going to stay now until we've had a chance to consider what the full federal court has to say about that issue.

01:54:38:08 - 01:55:11:06

But We did clarify in that update to the guidelines just what the role of agencies is when providing support to ministers, office officers. It's not consistent across the Commonwealth. But we are aware that many of you not only do FOI processing for your agency, but also for your minister's office, not All agencies do that. But there have been some issues around applicants understanding whether their request has been treated as a request the Minister or a request to the agency.

01:55:11:06 - 01:55:14:13

So, we've suggested that some clarity around that would be good.

01:55:18:07 - 01:56:01:13

We've also we are preparing to issue a self-assessment tool. So, this is a tool. It's not yet out, but it is one that we will be encouraging news agencies to use. Just to tell you a bit more about the health of your FOI practice, we may also use that when we're dealing with complaints. And I should have mentioned our very major success in relation to compliance, where we have entirely up a backlog of FOI complaints and we are now dealing we are now dealing with contemporary FOI complaints.

01:56:01:14 - 01:56:32:10

So, you're going to find it less useful to say we don't do it, that anymore. And one of the things that we're thinking of using the self-assessment tool is where we are going through a complaints process actually asking you to complete that and provide information to us about where some of the gaps might be. We're also looking at developing some e-learning modules to roll out.

01:56:32:10 - 01:56:41:07

That's pretty early days on that one. And I have mentioned the guidance on Minister's documents that you won't be getting for a while.

01:56:49:03 - 01:57:20:13

Now, look, I could talk to you for hours about Information Commissioner review decision, but I don't think it will. What we've done here is just extracted for you some of the themes of some of the decisions that we have handed down. As I said, we have a lot of matters around searches. We have had a lot of matters over the years

01:57:20:15 - 01:57:55:08

We are prioritizing such searches, matters as ones that we wish to resolve more quickly, perhaps than other matters, mainly because in many of those matters, the applicant hasn't may not have had a decision at all. So, it's not a question of reviewing how your decision has been made, but rather whether the documents have been found. We have, in the practice direction, implemented a streamlined of searches, matters coming through the ICC review process.

01:57:55:10 - 01:58:17:03

So, we you will be seeing those turn over a lot more quickly. We also, I think we no longer might I might be slightly out of date, but I think we no longer have any charges matters in our caseload results.

01:58:17:10 - 01:58:52:09

So, unless come in this morning, we have cleared all of those and hopefully made our view on charging quite clear. The other one practical refusals. We have a lot of practical refusals in our caseload and that's another cohort that we've been prioritized I mean, again, on the basis that if an applicant has had a practical refusal, they won't have had an initial decision on their FOI request.

01:58:52:10 - 01:59:40:05

We are still seeing a lot of them in our more recent matters that are being filed this year. So practical refusals are clearly a big thing. I could talk a bit more about practical refusals in the sense of the things we're saying. But I think what it all really does come back to is engagement with the applicant and making sure that they have a real opportunity to engage with the process, confine their request, hopefully to something that's manageable so that the requests can proceed through to be finalized.

01:59:40:07 - 02:00:15:01

What else have we got at the documents of a minister? But we're going to get a lot more guidance on that today. I did finalize one those matters earlier this year because it was one where we actually held the documents due to our case management. The documents were with us. And based on the judgment of the single judge that put us in a position to actually be able to process that metal.

02:00:15:02 - 02:00:38:06

So, for the time being until maybe 4:30 this afternoon, but we're hoping at 4:30 this afternoon, the full federal court will affirm the decision that was made by the single judge in that matter. But for the time being, the court has said that there is an obligation on ministers to preserve those documents and to preserve the rights of the applicants.

02:00:38:07 - 02:01:08:02

So, we will say, but that may not be the end of the matter. In any event. We have another matter involving Mr. Patrick, which was taken against the OIC, where we succeeded the full Federal Court. But this is currently subject to a special leave application in the High Court, so we may see a fight getting some airing the High Court sometime soon.

02:01:08:03 - 02:01:34:11

We've also had decisions around irrelevant material and removal of staff names. I will mention this one because I do say it a lot, which is where agencies take the view that because they have told the applicant that they're going to delete the names of staff, that that's enough to make the names of staff irrelevant from the FOI request.

02:01:34:12 - 02:02:31:08

That's now several ICC review decisions that you need to do more than that, that the applicant actually has to agree to exclude staff names from the request. It's an automatic default setting that departments can put in place. We've done a number of decisions on legal professional privilege and including discussion around what was known as the real harm test, which is not something that we can overturn on review, but it is something that is worthy of agencies considering and particularly around shifting to a more pro disclosure culture, is there any actual real harm that would be caused by releasing privileged documents?

02:02:31:08 - 02:03:16:03

And if not, that is a discretion. That's to agencies, not, however, something that as a Freedom of Information Commissioner, I can do. We've done a lot of matters on secrecy provisions. We actually decided to prioritize the cohort of six supervision matters where we are not the experts in your secrecy provisions. You are the experts, or your agencies are the experts in your secrecy provisions where we find that there is a complex debate around the meaning and application of the secrecy provision.

02:03:16:04 - 02:03:27:09

We have been referring some of those matters through to the IHT to determine, but we have also decided quite a number of Section 38 matters. We are considering whether we might do some further guidance on section 38 matters, mainly from the point of view of applicants who must find them. Very strange because you do get a really weird result where basically the secrecy provisions says, ‘No, I can't tell you things that you already told me no, I can't give you your own personal information back.’

02:03:57:04 - 02:04:32:02

So, we think that if some applicants understood that a bit more upfront, we might be able to head off some of the more difficult matters because I'm sure they must feel like it's all a bit mad. We've also done a lot of matters on conditional exemptions, so that's just a list. I think we're going to make these slides available after.

02:04:32:02 - 02:04:34:01

Speaker 3

So, you will be able to access all of these. This is just some ones that we've called out and this is the nice slide as a result of, I say, review decisions. What do we think that you're doing really well, we that your engagement with us is generally very productive. We have found that you are implementing our decisions. We do get the occasional further review from departments to the IHT, but that's actually pretty rare.

02:05:12:08 - 02:05:46:07

We find that you have been incorporated incorporating the learnings from ICI reviews into your processes. We think that you are engaging productively with applicants. Certainly, at the ICI review stage, we are seeing lots of examples where you able to facilitate access outside the FOI act in order to give the applicant the information they seek, even though strictly under the direction it might be exempt.

02:05:46:08 - 02:06:25:14

We have notice that reviews for charges reviews of charges have been dropped. So that is good. And we've seen a very significant reduction in the number of complaints that we're receiving from FOI applicants. Just a few tips for the ICI review process and what will help it work a bit better. I think we see that we're communicate with the applicant at the decision stage.

02:06:25:15 - 02:06:57:08

Then we get fewer disputes or the dispute itself is more confined to a particular issue rather than being a wide ranging. I hate everything that they did in relation to this. So, the more entrenched a dispute becomes, the harder it becomes to resolve both for us and for you. So, whatever you can do early to try and resolve the dispute will pay off.

02:06:57:10 - 02:07:21:13

Keeping good records of the searches that you've conducted. As I said, we get an awful lot of searches. Matters, and we also get an awful lot of matters where even when we explain to the applicant, look, you won't be able to get that piece of information because it's exempt. We think, you know, the agency's actually done a pretty good job here.

02:07:21:15 - 02:07:52:08

Then often an applicant will say, Oh, yeah, but I don't think they found. So sometimes things will turn into a search as matter as well as almost a last thing. So, the better your records are, the more streamlined we can be in reviewing that. And I think you'll see from a lot of our searches, not as we are satisfied when that evidence is made available to us about all of the different places that you've looked and all of the people that you've asked.

02:07:52:09 - 02:08:00:09

Then the results are clear.

02:08:01:14 - 02:08:28:06

Another tip is when you are providing your submissions to us that, you're comprehensive in your submissions on all matters. So, I do a lot of your matters, like I might do a lot of not just the Department of Home Affairs, I might do a lot of matters for Services Australia. So, I get the hang of what you're likely to argue on particular things.

02:08:28:07 - 02:08:55:04

But if the matter is an older one, sometimes not all of those same submissions are there and so I'll be trying to decide something, I think. Well, I know that the Department of Home Affairs thinks this about this thing, but they haven't said it in this case. And if they haven't it in this case, I kind of can't fill the gap for you because the applicant hasn't had a chance to respond to that point.

02:08:55:04 - 02:09:22:02

The applicant won't know that that's what you argue in every other matter. So just making sure that when we do get to that final stage and we're asking you for further submissions on older matters, that you actually go back and have a look and make sure that there is some currency to those matters and that you can put in those extra documents that you now know to put in, for example, about staff names.

02:09:22:03 - 02:09:52:05

So that's just a tip. And as I said earlier, don't assume that we're an expert in your secrecy provision and. I think my pet peeve is inconsistent redactions. So, if you give something out even by accident, somewhere in those documents, I'm probably going to give that same piece of information out throughout the documents. And it happens a lot.

02:09:52:07 - 02:10:12:13

And again, I can't kind of fill that gap for you by saying, oh, I think I might have done it once. I think you might have done that by mistake. But it's and I know you've got huge volumes of documents. You've probably got several people working on doing redactions. It is a tricky thing to get it right.

02:10:12:14 - 02:10:42:15

But it is very difficult at review for us to fix those errors. And the final one, as I said, a lot of agencies already do this, but consider providing access, even if strictly speaking there might be exemptions under the FOI Act if there's, you know, really no problem with giving out that piece of information, applicants prefer to get something boring and mundane to something that's blacked out.

02:10:42:15 - 02:11:06:14

They'll always think that the blacked-out thing is that really secret core piece of information that the government's withholding from them when it may actually just be, Oh, I heard you broke your leg on your holiday. Are you okay now? Something that ilk. So that brings me to the conclusion. And thank you very much for your time.

Assistant Director FOI Rocelle Ago

02:11:06:14 - 02:11:21:05

I'm going to hand over to Liz to close out the conference, but before I do so, I just wanted to say a very big thank you to the staff, the OAIC staff that are here today, Michelle, Lisa, Karen and Sara in our comms team online.

02:11:21:05 - 02:11:38:15

Andrew And Eva, who've really just helped make today happen and also to those who promote              FOI every day. So many of today's people.

Australian Information Commissioner Elizabeth Tydd

02:11:39:00 - 02:12:04:00

Thank you. One of the great pleasures and honours of working in this space is to be working with people who are values driven. And I think you've seen that from the presentations from the panel, from Tony, from Russell and from our FOI team who have been here since very, very early this morning and who have tirelessly put this event together with assistance from our comms team.

02:12:04:01 - 02:12:34:13

But I also want to thank you. The vibe in the room has been one of real commitment, of real engagement, of collaboration, a respectful relationship between regulator and communities of practice, and how we might work together more effectively to ensure that you're able to perform the function that is required of you under the Act knowing that you past first base anyway you represent in what you're doing.

02:12:34:13 - 02:13:06:11

That commitment to accountability, transparency, democratic values. But also I saw today real interest in the new ways, the new frontiers that we're presented with in government and how we might meet the challenges that we have in our specific domains of information governance broadly in that digital environment to better serve and to better uphold the principles that we achieve through the exercise of our statutory functions, but also importantly, the APS values.

02:13:06:11 - 02:13:32:00

And I just want to call out that last piece that Russell has highlighted in how we work together more, how we work with the APS, how we might work together with, and so how we collectively maximize the skill that's not only in this room but available to us in the environment. So, it's just been an absolute joy for me today to be here and my first Access to Information Day.

02:13:32:02 - 02:15:05:12

I hope you've felt some of that same feeling of affirming affirmation in the work that you do and know that you do it for the citizens, for the community of Australians that we all serve. And you play an incredibly important role. Thank you.