Follow-up audit report – Sunshine Coast Regional Council
Government agencies have a lot of information under their control. They should give access to this information unless there is a good reason not to. This ‘push’ model approach supports openness, transparency and accountability.
The Right to Information Act 2009 and the Information Privacy Act 2009 prescribe how government agencies must manage access to information. The objective of our 2021 audit was to determine whether the council was complying with specific prescribed requirements. We made 22 recommendations to improve practices and compliance. The council supported them and agreed to their implementation within what was, a limited timeframe.
As part of our performance monitoring functions, we regularly follow-up on our audit reports and examine how agencies have implemented our recommendations. The Information Commissioner presented a report about the Sunshine Coast Regional Council’s progress in implementing recommendations to the Queensland Parliament’s Legal Affairs and Safety Committee. The Chair tabled the report in Parliament on 28 November 2023:
‘Follow-up of Report No. 1 for 2021-22
Audit of Sunshine Coast Regional Council’s implementation of recommendations’
The follow-up audit concludes that the council has fully implemented eleven recommendations, partially implemented four and is on track to implement a further five recommendations. The council has made some progress to implement the remaining two recommendations.
