Vincent Neary v State Rail Authority [1999] NSWADT 107

CITATION: Vincent Neary v State Rail Authority [1999] NSWADT 107

DIVISION: General

APPLICANT: Vincent Neary

RESPONDENT: Chief Executive, State Rail Authority

FILE NUMBER: 993048

HEARING DATES: 08/03/1999

SUBMISSIONS CLOSED: 08/03/1999

DATE OF DECISION: 9 November 1999

Judge K P O'Connor - President BEFORE:

PRIMARY LEGISLATION: Freedom of Information Act 1989

APPLICATION: Review of decision to refuse access to documents (or part thereof) -

MATTER FOR DECISION: Principal matter

Applicant: In person REPRESENTATION: Respondent: E Collins of counsel, instructed by D Hawke of Minter Ellison Lawyers

ORDERS: 1. That the agency's decision to refuse access to the documents in dispute (being ten invoices relating to legal fees payable to the Crown Solicitor's Office and in relation to other disbursements such as counsel's fees) be set aside. 2. That the documents in dispute be disclosed to the applicant, with the deletion of the hand-written references to hours worked and the hourly rate found in the invoices numbered 57809 and 64423.

1 Vincent Neary (the applicant) worked for many years with the State Rail Authority (the agency). 2 While an employee in 1989 he reported concerns to the Chief Executive about, what he has described in an affidavit prepared for these proceedings, as 'serious maladministration and suspected large-scale corruption in the signalling area'. 3 He says in his affidavit that an investigation ensued and found no serious improprieties or corruption in any of the matters raised. He says that he was then subject to a campaign of victimisation and harassment at work, his performance was assessed as poor and his employment was terminated in March 1993. He appealed unsuccessfully against his dismissal to the Transport Appeals Board. 4 Since that time the applicant has sought to obtain access to records compiled by the agency relating to its investigations and relating to him personally, through the medium of requests under the Freedom of Information Act 1989 (the FOI Act). He has made numerous requests - in his affidavit he says these total 25. 5 The request giving rise to this application was first made to the agency on 3 August 1998 and was marked as received by the agency on 5 August 1998. The request had two elements: (1) It sought access to the documents setting out the full details of the legal fees incurred by the agency in responding to an appeal by him to the District Court in relation to refusals of access to other documents sought under the Act. (2) It also sought copies of documents which he said had been 'supplied to Mr Michael Egan [the Treasurer] and/or the Minister for Transport to support the statements made concerning the Authority's use of infrastructure funds to prop up loss making passenger services'. In relation to the second matter the applicant referred in his request to a story in the Sydney Morning Herald on 1 May 1997 that appeared under the headline '$1bn rail losses concealed, says Egan' and contained the following statement: