I have been a member of the Andrea Vance Fan Club since she became “mad as hell” about Parliamentary Services tracking her movements around Parliament and logging her telephone calls.
The surveillance of the Stuff political journalist’s movements and communications in 2013 were revealed during an enquiry into the leaking of a report on the Government Communications Security Bureau. The leak of the Kitteridge Report had been a Vance scoop and the aftermath played out like the old Mad Magazine comic strip Spy v Spy.
I am sending in my application for platinum membership after last Sunday’s recounting of the stonewalling, obfuscation, and obstruction she has encountered in following up her latest scoop. The week before, writing in the Sunday Star Times, she had broken the story of allegations that Te Pati Māori had misused personal information gathered for the last census.
The Manurewa Marae facilitated the collection of data from tangata whenua by providing a collection centre. Vance broke the story that Stats NZ was investigating claims the party used information on the census forms collected at the marae to help its local candidate’s election campaign. The party and its president John Tamihere have vociferously denied the claims of misuse.
Vance’s column in last Sunday’s edition was devoted to recounting her “Sisyphean endeavours” to find out what agencies of government were investigating the matter, and on what aspects each was focussed.
Her reference to the Greek myth of Sisyphus no doubt related to the punishment the gods imposed on him – eternally pushing a boulder up a hill only to have it roll down again. The to-and-fro she experienced with government departments must have felt exactly like that.
However, there was another side to the King of Corinth that might be equally applied to the situation Vance recounted. Sisyphus was a devious tyrant who was punished by the gods for trickery. While our bureaucrats stop short of killing visitors (one of the king’s party tricks), they are certainly not above devious demonstrations of their power. She set out in detail how that manifests itself.
Once upon a time, journalists used to be able to pick up the phone and speak to a real person from a government agency. But many of the standard features of news reporting like in-person press conferences, with an opportunity for follow-up questions, and media phone lines where journalists could talk to a staffer, have disappeared. They were replaced by written statements that offer less clarity, rarely answer questions and create greater distance between the public service and the people it serves.
She went on to recount how she had asked Stats NZ for clarification on a written statement that mentioned the involvement of the police. She was simply sent the original statement again and told to contact the Police, which she immediately did. Two days later, Police told her that they could not comment as the matter was under investigation. What was under investigation? You may well ask, but don’t expect to get an answer from the Police comms team, or from the Electoral Commission which seemed to be playing word games with the journalist. All of this was played out in emails. There was no direct contact with real people.
Vance is not the first journalist to lay out the Byzantine twists and turns encountered in trying to extract information from public servants (a term I use with some hesitation in these circumstances). I cannot forget a story published during my time at the New Zealand Herald. In the course of the Ahmed Zaoui saga in 2002-3, we came across an Immigration Service media log referencing the paper’s editorial. There was a note attached which said: “I was let down badly. Everyone had agreed to lie in unison, but all the others caved in, and I was the only one left singing the original song.” Yes, that was an extreme example but there are innumerable examples of unwarranted levels of control, denial and duckshoving. It has become institutionalised.
Blanket rejections on grounds of ‘privacy’ or ‘under investigation’ sound plausible but how many have a real basis in law? When the person whose ‘privacy’ is at stake is happy to talk to a journalist, what possible grounds can a bureaucrat have for withholding relevant information? Why is the release of even the basic facts of a Police investigation somehow prejudicial to the case?
It is time to call out these practices and to show the public what they are being denied without good cause. It amounts to unacceptable misuse of power by bureaucrats – and by their political masters who may be the beneficiaries. Politicians could stop practices that ignore, if not the provisions of the Official Information Act, then certainly its spirit. Yet, for decades, whoever occupied the treasury benches has been complicit in denying access to information that is manifestly in the public interest.
Vance has taken a small step by telling the public about the antics being employed to keep them in the dark, or to control the narrative, on a matter that could call into question the integrity of one of the cornerstones of civil society. Like the secrecy of the ballot box, the security of personal information provided for the census has been a given and must remain so. Her story raised questions over that integrity and it beggars belief that officials should be anything but open and frank about investigating the allegations. The fact that such openness has not been forthcoming speaks to the fact that there is a systemic belief that official information must be controlled.
That must stop.
The Official Information Act contains an inordinate number of reasons for withholding information. Of course, within each of those legislative provisions is a genuine case for secrecy. However, those provisions can be – and too often are – misused. Interpretations and extensions of meaning beyond the real intentions of the Act are commonplace.
Public servants and, in particular the communications practitioners among them, must be called out when they misuse the OIA principle that “information shall be made available unless there is good reason for withholding it”. The language may be unacceptably un-parliamentarian but I interpret that qualification to mean “bloody good reason”. In other word, the basis for maintaining secrecy must be compelling. Too often, it is not. When that is the case, the public servant hiding behind Sections 6-11 of the Act should be asked to detail the grounds on which one of its provisions is applied and the consequences of publication. The story should detail the request and the answer.
The official ‘spokespeople’ in news stories are invariably faceless, nameless and unaccountable. That also needs to change. Officials providing information or responding to journalists’ requests routinely should be named. By naming the spokesperson who is obstructive or who withholds information without good cause, there is a measure of accountability that may alter behaviour over time.
When a story demands an interview, but only emailed questions will be accepted, the story should state that an interview (with a named person) was refused, what questions were posed, the responses, and the reasons why the email exchange failed to elicit the information that could be forthcoming in a face-to-face encounter.
Too often, journalists and the organisations they represent have accepted the officially imposed status quo and have not communicated the situation to their readers, listeners or viewers. That may well mean the blame for an absence of information is laid at the door of the journalist. How often have you heard people say “Why didn’t they ask about…? Perhaps the journalist did ask but Stonewall in the Ministry of Silence would not provide the answer. If stories contained more about the processes employed in gathering the information – and, crucially, the impediments placed in the journalist’s path – audiences would have a far better appreciation of what is being denied them.
It is time for journalists to claim back some of the power that has been taken from them. No, let me rephrase that: It is time for journalists to claim back some of the power that has been taken from the people of New Zealand. That power lies in demanding the right to know.
Good commentary.
The introduction of the “no surprises” mantra completely destroyed individual accountability and made everything however minor needing to fit with a perception of the wishes of ministers. This coincided with the rise of the political advisors, as we tried to mimic the Blairite controls of Alistair Campbell and his ilk. Our most visible manifestation was known as H2, even to ministers as was also the case in the UK. The right appointment as public services commissioner is the only way to reverse.