OSN and Department of Families

Application number:
2001 S0249
Decision date:
Wednesday, Jun 26, 2002

OSN and Department of Families
(2001 S0249, 26 June 2002)

This was a ‘sufficiency of search’ case, in which the applicant contended that the Department should hold additional documents concerning herself and other members of her family that it had not located and disclosed to her in its response to her FOI access application.  The applicant suggested a number of locations in which documents could be held, including a non-government care agency which was not under the Department’s control, but further detailed searches and inquiries by the Department failed to locate any additional material held by the Department or its officers. 

Assistant Commissioner Barker decided there were no reasonable grounds for believing additional responsive documents existed in the Department's possession or control, and that the searches and inquiries made by the Department to locate any such documents had been reasonable in all the circumstances of the case.