Recent Cases: Victoria

Department of Health v Lovell [2024] VCAT 998

Facts

In January 2022, Ms Wendy Lovell MP (“respondent”) made a Freedom of Information request (“request”) to the Department of Health (“Department”).  The documents identified were an Executive Summary, another document and a business case for the redevelopment of the Goulburn Valley Health Shepparton Hospital (“Business Case”).  

The Department refused the request on the basis of multiple exemptions, which the respondent sought review of by the Office of the Victorian Information Commissioner (“Commissioner”).  The Commissioner determined that the Department should release the Executive Summary in full, and the Business Case in part.  The Department released the Executive Summary but sought review by the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (“Tribunal”) in relation to the decision on the Business Case, on the basis that it was a Cabinet document. 

Held 

The Tribunal found that the Business Case was exempt under s 28(1)(b).   

Reasoning 

Cabinet documents - s 28(1)(b)

The Department’s evidence was that business cases were exclusively created for the purposes of obtaining approval from the Expenditure Review Sub-Committee of Cabinet (“Committee”).  The Department submitted that the document must have been prepared only for submission to the Committee, as it had followed the standard template for a Department business case document, and the information relating to key points and State Budget papers had indicated that it was created for the Committee. 

In making its decision, the Tribunal took into account that no argument had been put before it for an alternative purpose that the Business Case document would have been prepared, other than for the Committee.

The Tribunal accepted that the Committee is a sub-committee of Cabinet, and while the evidence of a document going to the Cabinet is not determinative of it being considered, it is relevant.  The Tribunal was satisfied by the submissions, evidence, and the document itself, that it had been prepared and submitted to Cabinet for its consideration.