Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987

The Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987 (sometimes known by its acronym LGOIMA) is a statute of the New Zealand Parliament which creates a public right of access to information held by local authorities and council-controlled organisations and sets standards of openness for local authority meetings. It is one of New Zealand's freedom of information laws.

Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987
New Zealand Parliament
Royal assent17 July 1987
Commenced1 March 1988
Administered byMinister of Internal Affairs
Introduced byMichael Bassett
Amended by
None
Related legislation
Official Information Act 1982
Status: Current legislation

Summary of the Act

The Act is an implementation of freedom of information legislation. It creates a regime by which any person can request and receive information held by local authorities and council-controlled organisations. The request regime mirrors that of the Official Information Act 1982 (OIA), with similar (though more limited) withholding grounds. A significant difference is that requests under LGOIMA can be made by "any person", rather than New Zealand citizens or residents.[1] As with the OIA, decisions made under the Act can be appealed to the Ombudsman,[2] and there is immunity from civil and criminal proceedings for good faith decisions to release information under the Act.[3]

The Act also sets standards for local government transparency, requiring that meetings of local authorities be publicly notified and open to the public and that their agendas, reports, and minutes be available to the public.[4] Local authorities can exclude the public from part of a meeting only after a resolution and for specified reasons.[5] Additional provisions provide privilege against defamation for local authority minutes and agendas, and protect oral statements made at local authority meetings.[6]

In 2012 the Act was reviewed by the New Zealand Law Commission as part of its review of the OIA. The Law Commission recommended that it be incorporated into a rewritten, general freedom of information law covering both central and local government.[7]

See also

References
  1. LGOIMA, section 10.
  2. LGOIMA, Part 5.
  3. LGOIMA, section 41.
  4. LGOIMA, part 7.
  5. LGOIMA, section 48.
  6. LGOIMA, sections 52 and 53.
  7. The Public's Right to Know: Review of the Official Information Legislation (PDF) (Report). New Zealand Law Commission. June 2012. Retrieved 17 October 2018.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.