NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather forecasts

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
    • The Great NZ Road Trip
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
    • Cooking the Books
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • What the Actual
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / New Zealand

OIA requests website relaunched by the Herald

By Caleb Tutty
Data news developer·NZ Herald·
14 Apr, 2015 03:08 AM6 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

FYI.org.nz, originally setup in 2009, helps members of public with Official Information Act requests.

FYI.org.nz, originally setup in 2009, helps members of public with Official Information Act requests.

The Herald is helping relaunch FYI.org.nz - a website which helps members of the public to make Official Information Act (OIA) requests.

Rowan Crawford, a software developer, set up the FYI website after a 2009 Open Government event as the first version of this tool outside of the United Kingdom.

Users of the FYI website can make requests and receive replies from various government agencies directly through the website.

Over almost six years of operation the FYI website has built up a repository of 2,480 requests from 1,256 users.

Mr Crawford said the OIA, introduced in 1982 to promote transparency and accountability of public agencies, has been weakened over time.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

"Ways to circumnavigate it are in the first place discovered, and in the second place accepted."

The Ombudsman Dame Beverley Wakem has announced an independent review of government agencies and ministerial offices in December. She expected the investigation to act as a "valuable health check".

Mr Crawford is stepping back from the project to concentrate on work commitments with start-up Hapara, and the Herald has agreed to help run the website.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Recent requests include asking for documents provided to Ministry of Social Development Fraud investigators, looking at reviews of Medical Cannabis and detailing the gender breakdown of Scholarship Chemistry Exam results.

The FYI website has even fielded a request to provide any evidence that the Prime Minister is not a "David Icke style shapeshifting reptilian alien" which received media attention for the good-humoured reply, "no official information specific to [the] request has been identified".

UK-based charity MySociety created the original software which was later named Alaveteli, and versions have been launched around world in countries including Australia, Hungary, the Ukraine, Uruguay and Rwanda.

Freedom of information laws like New Zealand's Official Information Act exist in at least 95 countries, but continue to cause tension with authorities.

Tony Blair described the United Kingdom's laws as "utterly undermining of sensible government" and closer to home, John Key came under fire for admitting the government has deliberately delayed answering requests.

OIA requests require responses within a statutory maximum period of 20 working days, with extensions allowed under certain circumstances.

Legislation also states that ministers and public agencies must respond as soon as reasonably possible, however Mr Key has stated "sometimes we wait the 20 days because, in the end, Government might take the view that's in our best interest to do that".

Revelations from Dirty Politics showed that information delayed for release had been passed on to a blogger for political purposes.

Go to FYI.org.nz to make an OIA request.

For more details about the OIA request process see the Ministry of Justice FAQ.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Read David Fisher's speech about experiences with the OIA to public officials.

Q & A with Rowan Crawford:

When did FYI.org.nz start?

It started from the hack day after this event: https://wiki.open.org.nz/wiki/display/main/Barcamp+and+Hackfest

I got a fork of whatdotheyknow.com up and going in Wellington airport heading home on the Sunday. At the time Alaveteli didn't exist - NZ was the first new jurisdiction.

How did you hear about Alaveteli?

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

"OIA Requests Online" made it on to a post-it note for possible projects at the hack day - someone mentioned that there was a site in the UK, and Google did the rest.

Alaveteli happened after that, after MySociety got some funding to help other countries do similar sites. So really it's down to the ability of MySociety to put the case for funding for civic society apps.

What made you decide to take on the mantle to maintain an Alaveteli install?

To be honest, I kind of fell into it. There were a lot of barriers (not least fear of legal risk) that were solved by ignoring them. It wouldn't have happened without encouragement & resources from Open NZ and later OKFN.

For a long time I had this idea that the government would take over the project once it'd been stood up - that, in my mind, was all I was committing to, standing up the project.

What is it like at the helm of a popular volunteer run civic society project? Does New Zealand have a large enough community to support these kinds of volunteer efforts?

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

The community is really quite small for this kind of thing! Although, having said that, it was clear to me from questions forwarded on from MySociety that people were looking at getting started, but something was going wrong with communicating what was already there - people looking for things to do in NZ were finding civic society work in the UK easier than they were finding local work.

Have you had many discussions with MySociety or other international groups running Alaveteli? How do their experiences compare?

MySociety have been quite active at getting feedback and they sponsored me to both of the Alaveteli conferences.

One thing that's clear to me is that while there are problems, we're also in a relatively good state internationally. The principles are clear with a presumption of openness and there isn't a patchwork of legislation. There's no barrier of a blanket request fee in place. In some jurisdictions it's a risky political act to make a freedom of information request.

What have been some of the most interesting interactions, requests and experiences you've had with running FYI?

I have an enduring affection for the requests for the police procedure manuals, in that they mostly got answered.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

What has been the most challenging?

Definitely site stability - it's not my wheelhouse, and if I was going to get it in the neck, it'd be then, which I 100% understand.

How have you found the interaction with public bodies receiving requests from FYI? Do they look on FYI positively or an increase in work load? Any horror stories (that you wouldn't mind published)?

My interactions have overwhelmingly been positive - there seems to be an understanding of the site's role as a conduit. I think the value of the site in reducing duplication of requests and responses is reasonably well understood.

The worst experiences have been people using the site to throw mud at people & public bodies and cleaning up after that.

In general, do you think that the OIA is working well or are there aspects that could improve? What could government do (if anything) to make the process easier and more transparent?

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

I think the OIA is being weakened over time as ways to circumnavigate it are in the first place discovered, and in the second place accepted.

One project I would like to see is to open up the Office of the Ombudsman's work queue. When things go wrong with the OIA it ends up there, and it's my understanding that situation's worsening. If that information were opened up it might make the health of the OIA more transparent.

One thing that happened in the UK parliament was that stats from whatdotheyknow.com have been tabled, and taken as motivation for public bodies to not be last on that list. To my understanding that hasn't happened here ... yet.

What advice would you give to any one wanting to get involved in a civic project?

Just Do It!

Save

    Share this article

Latest from New Zealand

New Zealand

Flooding in Wairau Valley

New Zealand

'Pure panic': Mum speaks out after son victim of terrifying dog attack

09 May 06:34 AM
live
New Zealand

Watch: Flights delayed at Auckland Airport as intense rain batters city, surface flooding

09 May 06:32 AM

One tiny baby’s fight to survive

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from New Zealand

Flooding in Wairau Valley

Flooding in Wairau Valley

Flooding in Wairau Valley on Auckland's North Shore. Video / Jonathon Edward Powell

'Pure panic': Mum speaks out after son victim of terrifying dog attack

'Pure panic': Mum speaks out after son victim of terrifying dog attack

09 May 06:34 AM
Watch: Flights delayed at Auckland Airport as intense rain batters city, surface flooding
live

Watch: Flights delayed at Auckland Airport as intense rain batters city, surface flooding

09 May 06:32 AM
Probe into unexplained death after discovery of man’s body in Northland

Probe into unexplained death after discovery of man’s body in Northland

09 May 06:18 AM
Connected workers are safer workers 
sponsored

Connected workers are safer workers 

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • NZ Herald e-editions
  • Daily puzzles & quizzes
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Subscribe to the NZ Herald newspaper
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • What the Actual
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven CarGuide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP