After revelations emerged NSW Police hadremoved a reference to the Tasering from an official press release – a decision later attributed to ensuring Nowland’s extended family were notified prior – a freedom of information request from the Coalition in September wasreturned with entire documents redacted.
Catley’s office tried to explain the blacked-out pages by arguing the release of correspondence would inhibit the ability of government officials to make written records which “would be to the detriment of the processes of government”.
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But a review by the IPC,the statutory authority that deals with access to government held information,criticised the response from the offices of the police minister and NSW Premier Chris Minns,saying the justification for the redaction of material was insufficient.
“The fact that the government information at issue is numerous,diverse and of differing origin,makes it difficult to reconstruct the reasoning underlying some of these redactions,” the IPC acting director said.
The IPC criticised both offices’ efforts to retrieve information relating to the request,querying whether there had been any efforts to retrieve text messages in relation to the incident or claims about the non-existence of drafts and previous versions of key documents.
“Overall,I am not satisfied that the Agency’s decision,that it holds no further information responsive to the access application,has been justified. I have formed this view primarily due to the existence of relevant text message records,” the IPC review said.