Waite v Hornsby Shire Council [2011] NSWADT 259

Administrative Decisions Tribunal New South Wales Medium Neutral Citation: Waite v Hornsby Shire Council [2011] NSWADT 259 Hearing dates: 6 April 2011 Decision date: 11 November 2011 Jurisdiction: General Division Before: S Higgins, Deputy President Decision: The decision of the respondent is affirmed. Catchwords: Amendment of agency's record - whether information in agency's record for which amendment was sought concerned the personal affairs of the applicant Legislation Cited: The Freedom of Information Act 1989 (Repealed) Government Information (Public Access) Act 2009 Government Information (Public Access Consequential Amendments and Repeal Act) Act 2009 Privacy and Government Information Legislation Amendment Act 2010 Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act 1998 Cases Cited: Crewdson v Central Sydney Area Health Service [2002] NSWCA 345 Waite v Hornsby Shire Council [2010] NSWADT 32 Waite v Hornsby Shire Council [2009] NSWADT117 Category: Principal judgment Parties: Peter Waite (Applicant) Hornsby Shire Council (Respondent) Representation: Counsel S Epstein (Applicant) B Woolf (Applicant) I Woodward (Respondent ) File Number(s): 103307

REasons for decision

Introduction 1GENERAL DIVISION (S Higgins, Deputy President): The applicant, Mr Peter Waite, seeks review of a decision of the respondent, Hornsby Shire Council, refusing to amend three documents for which he sought amendment under Part 6A of the Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act 1998 (PPIP Act) and the Government Information (Public Access) Act 2009 (GIPA Act). 2The documents for which Mr Waite sought amendment are as follows: * memorandum GN08/08, dated 30 April 2008, from the general manager of the respondent (Mr Robert Ball) to the Mayor and all Councillors concerning correspondence received from Mr Waite on 14 April 2008. In his letter, Mr Waite had questioned the correctness of the advice Mr Ball had given, on 12 March 2008, during an ordinary meeting of the respondent Council (Document 1 - 30 April Memo). The advice related to whether Councillor Isaac was required to leave the meeting during discussions of Item 2 as he had tabled a pro-forma declaration of interest in regard to that agenda item; * letter, dated 1 May 2008, from the Mayor to Mr Waite responding to Mr Waite's letter of 14 April 2008 (Document 3 - 1 May letter); and * letter, dated 1 July 2009, from Mr Ball to Mr Waite responding to Mr Waite's letter dated 24 June 2009 (Document 5 - 1 July 2009 letter). 3The respondent had determined that the amendments sought by Mr Waite did not concern his 'personal affairs' and for this reason it refused to make the amendments sought. The respondent found that the amendments sought by Mr Waite were matters that concerned the personal affairs of a person other than Mr Waite, or were matters that were no more than matters of personal interest to Mr Waite. 4While Mr Waite had sought numerous amendments to each of the documents listed above, many were not pursued any further by the time the matter was listed for hearing.