1 Feb 2012, 09:00

A man made complaints about his neighbour to his local council. His complaints were made on the basis that his name would remain confidential.

The neighbour asked the council to provide him with all of the information it held about the complaints. This request was made under section 10 of The Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987 ('LGOIMA').

Section 10(1) of LGOIMA says:

Any person may request any local authority to make available to that person any specified official information.

When the council released information to the neighbour in response to his request, it failed to remove the complainant's name, due to an administrative oversight.

The neighbour then confronted the man about having made complaints to the council.

The man complained to us that the council had disclosed his personal information to his neighbour.

The man's complaint raised issues under principle 11 (disclosure) and section 7 of the Privacy Act.

Principle 11 and section 7

Principle 11 of the Act states that an agency that holds personal information must not disclose that information unless it has reasonable grounds to believe that one of the exceptions set out under principle 11 applies. None of the exceptions within principle 11 applied in this case.

However, section 7(1) of the Privacy Act states that if personal information can or must be disclosed under another statute then that other statute will override principle 11.

LGOIMA is clearly a statute that authorises or requires disclosure of information.

Under section 41 of LGOIMA, if an organisation releases information in response to a section 10 request in good faith, it will be protected from any civil or criminal proceedings arising from releasing that information. This includes Privacy Act proceedings.

If information is accidentally or wrongly released, the Ombudsmen may be able to consider whether the organisation acted reasonably in terms of the Ombudsmen Act, but the Privacy Act will not apply.

Here, the council had released information in good faith in response to the neighbour's request. It simply made a mistake when it included information that identified the man. LGOIMA applied and overrode principle 11.

Although there was no breach of the Privacy Act, the council agreed to meet with the man, so that they could understand how the disclosure of his identity had affected him. This was a helpful way to conclude this dispute.

December 2012

Disclosure of personal information - Local Authority - request under Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987 - Privacy Act 1993; principle 11, section 7