BUREAUCRATS have taken legal action to hide an embarrassing email about acting Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce until after the election.
The department of agriculture said yesterday it would go to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal to keep hidden an email it had been ordered by its own watchdog to hand to the Herald Sun.
The move means the email, written to Mr Joyce by then department secretary Paul Grimes, will not be handed over, as the Information Commissioner had ruled.
Instead, it will be the subject of expensive legal wrangling funded by the taxpayer.
The Herald Sun sought the email using Freedom of Information laws, after Dr Grimes wrote a robust character assessment of Mr Joyce late in 2014. He later sought to withdraw it, but the damage was done and he was sacked by then PM Tony Abbott.
The department has kept the email hidden from public scrutiny for more than a year.
April 24, 2015
The Herald Sun lodges a Freedom of Information request for the email
July 17, 2015
The Department of Agriculture rejects the request and keeps the email secret
July 28, 2015
The Herald Sun applies to the Information Commissioner for review of the decision
March 17, 2016
The Information Commissioner finds for the Herald Sun and orders the department to hand over the letter Thursday
Mr Joyce becomes acting Prime Minister while Malcolm Turnbull is out of the country
Yesterday
The department takes legal action and will go to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal seeking to keep the email secret
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/taxpayer-funds-used-for-legal-fight-to-keep-emb...Oh Dear Barnaby, misleading Parliament and then trying to get Hansard changed. Nortie little man.....
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