Freedom of Information Amendment Act 1983 No. 81 of 1983 - SECT 10 Time within which formal requests to be decided

Freedom of Information Amendment Act 1983 No. 81 of 1983 - SECT 10

10. Section 19 of the Principal Act is amended-

   (a)  by omitting paragraph (1) (c) and substituting the following
        paragraph:

''(c) is sent by post to the agency or Minister, or delivered to an officer of
the agency or a member of the staff of the Minister, at the appropriate
address in relation to the agency or the Minister,'';

   (b)  by inserting in sub-section (1) ''that the request has been received,
        as soon as practicable but in any case not later than 14 days after
        the day on which the request is received by or on behalf of the agency
        or
Minister, and'' after ''notified'';

   (c)  by omitting from sub-section (1) ''as soon as practicable but in any
        case not later than 60 days'' and substituting ''(including a decision
        under section 21 to defer the provision of access to a document) as
        soon as practicable but in any case not later than the expiration of
        the relevant period''; and

   (d)  by omitting sub-section (2) and substituting the following
        sub-sections:

''(2) In sub-section (1), 'the appropriate address', in relation to an agency
or to a Minister, means an address of that agency or of that Minister that is-

   (a)  specified in a notice (being a notice that is in force at the time of
        the request) published in the Gazette by the responsible Minister of
        the agency or by the Minister, as the case may be, as an address to
        which requests made in pursuance of this Act may be sent or delivered
        in accordance with this section; or

   (b)  if, in respect of the agency or Minister, there is no notice in force
        specifying such an address-

        (i)    in the case of an agency-the address of the office or principal
               office of the agency that was last specified in the
               Commonwealth Government Directory; and

        (ii)   in the case of a Minister-the address of the office or
               principal office of the Department of State administered by the
               Minister that was last specified in the Commonwealth Government
               Directory.

''(3) In sub-section (1), 'the relevant period', in relation to a request made
to an agency or to a Minister for access to a document, means, subject to
sub-section (4)-

   (a)  in a case where the request is received before 1 December 1984-60
        days;

   (b)  in a case where a request is received on or after 1 December 1984 but
        before 1 December 1986-45 days; and

   (c)  in any other case-30 days.

''(4) Where a request has been made to an agency or to a Minister for access
to a document, being a request in relation to which, but for this sub-section,
the relevant period for the purposes of sub-section (1) would be the period
specified in paragraph (3) (b) or (c), and that agency or that Minister, as
the case requires, determines in writing that the requirements of section 26A
or 27 make it appropriate to extend that relevant period, the relevant period
in relation to that request shall be taken, by force of this sub-section, to
be extended by a period of 15 days.

''(5) Where an agency or a Minister makes a determination in writing under
sub-section (4), in relation to a request, that agency or Minister shall
forthwith inform the applicant that the relevant period in relation to that
request has been extended, in pursuance of that sub-section, by a period of 15
days.''.