KEY POINTS:
The Catholic Church is fighting a court battle to keep secret information a man gave about his former wife to have their marriage annulled.
Though the divorce has been finalised, the woman went to the church to find out what her husband said about her during the church's
annulment proceedings.
When the church refused to tell her, she took action under the Privacy Act. But the church insists that a tribunal founded under its own canon law is not subject to the act.
The Catholic Tribunal is a central church authority. While it is chiefly responsible for marriage annulment hearings, it hears a variety of other matters including investigations of disputes involving parishes and bishops, and paedophile priests.
The rules governing its operation date back to the 11th century.
The Human Rights Review Tribunal took on the woman's case and asked the High Court to rule on whether the Catholic Tribunal is subject to the Privacy Act.
Justice Mark Cooper - who described the hearing as "a refreshing change" from murder - heard the matter in the High Court at Auckland yesterday.
Peter McKenzie, QC, for the church, told him the Catholic Tribunal was governed by "codes of canon law" that were "a creation of the church over a long period of time".
The central question for Justice Cooper was two-pronged, he said: Did the word "tribunal" include non-statutory tribunals in the terms of the Privacy Act, and if it did, was the definition limited only to those tribunals recognised by law.
"On its plain reading, the word 'tribunal' should be given a meaning which does not limit it to statutory tribunals but to any body properly constituted as a tribunal exercising judicial functions."
But lawyer Bob Stevens, for the Director of Human Rights Proceedings, said adopting the Catholic definition of "tribunal" would be equivalent to "driving a coach and horses through the Privacy Act".
Such a move would allow virtually any group or organisation to establish its own constitution, effectively exempting itself from the Privacy Act.
That would mean anyone wishing to access information held about them would have to go through a "hugely unwieldy and costly" High Court judicial review, Mr Stevens said.
That would be contrary to the spirit of the Privacy Act, which allowed - through the office of the Privacy Commissioner - for "relatively informal and free-of-cost" access to personal information.
Justice Cooper reserved his decision.
