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A danger to safety
Sometimes releasing information to a requester may put someone's physical safety at risk: either the requester him or herself, an employee of the agency, or someone else.
There must be some evidence to indicate that a danger in fact exists [Case Note 92314]. But if there is evidence of a real risk, the agency can withhold the information. Safety is more important than rights of access to information.
As the law stands at the moment, the threat must be one of physical harm - it does not include the idea of ‘mental safety' (M v Ministry of Health [1997] CRT 16/96 (Decision # 12/97) - see download below).
References
Privacy Act 1993
Section 27(1)
An agency may refuse to disclose any information requested pursuant to principle 6 if the disclosure of the information would be likely -
(d) to endanger the safety of any individual
Case Notes:
Case Note 7454
HRRT/Court cases:
Downloads
Cable-v-NZ-Insolvency-Trustee-Service-1999-CRT-30-98-Decision-10-99.PDF
PDF, 356 KB
M-v-Ministry-of-Health-1997-CRT-16-96-Decision-12-97.PDF
PDF, 546 KB
M-v-New-Zealand-Police-1997-CRT-17-96-Decision-13-97.PDF
PDF, 536 KB
O-v-N-1996-CRT-19-94.PDF
PDF, 1001 KB
Te-Koeti-v-Otago-District-Health-Board-HRRT-4-09-decision-24-09.doc
DOC, 43 KB