There has been much commentary, most of it critical, about federal Attorney-General Michelle Rowland’s recently introduced Bill that amends the Freedom of Information Act by restricting access through measures that will allow undermine a core democratic principles – accountability by government to the people it serves.

A repost from 17 September 2025.

The Bill continues the overall trend in Australia towards reducing transparency in government. When the Fraser Government introduced the first Freedom of Information Bill in 1978 (a further 1981 Bill became law in 1982), Rowland’s predecessor, the former Western Australian Senator Peter Durack, said that while “[c]omplete openness of government is not possible. For some purposes, confidentiality is essential. The Freedom of Information Bill seeks to achieve the appropriate balance between openness and secrecy".

That balance can longer be said to be appropriate. While all governments in recent years have made it harder for the community to obtain access to government information, the Albanese Government has been even worse than the previous Coalition Governments. The Centre for Public Integrity in July this year said that the ”Albanese Government is less transparent than its predecessor” with “only 25% of requests fully granted under Labor, down from nearly half in 2021-22".

An examination of the Bill, as currently drafted, tells us something disturbing: that the scope for........

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