Senator MURRAY (1:02 PM) —I have circulated to the chamber amendment No. 2346. I move:

This amendment is to the Freedom of Information Act, and it addresses the ability of people to access information in the possession of government. FOI laws exist, firstly, to allow access to certain personal information held by government departments and, secondly, to provide a general right of access to government information. It was this general right that President Madison rightly identified as a `democratic imperative'. It is imperative because, unless citizens have the power to access and independently scrutinise government information, there is little prospect of having a genuinely deliberative and participatory democracy. FOI opens government up to the people. It allows people to participate in policy, accountability and decision making processes. It opens the government's activities to scrutiny, discussion, comment and review.

Former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser identified as a fundamental requirement that `people and Parliament have the knowledge required to pass judgment on the government'. He said, `Too much secrecy inhibits people's capacity to judge the government's performance.' In 1983, Prime Minister Bob Hawke put the case bluntly: `Information about Government operations is not, after all, some kind of “favour” to be bestowed by a benevolent government or to be extorted from a reluctant bureaucracy. It is, quite simply, a public right.'

My amendment addresses a deficiency at present and will correct it. As senators who follow these matters know, I have a private senator's bill designed to address real weaknesses in our FOI jurisdiction, which has had a very good unanimous response from the Senate committee. As we all know, the bias is still on the bureaucracy and their ability to restrain the release of information, but this at least addresses the need for some further access to be allowed.