Frost v Office of the Queensland Ombudsman

[2021] QCATA 57

QUEENSLAND CIVIL AND
ADMINISTRATIVE TRIBUNAL

CITATION:

Frost v Office of the Queensland Ombudsman & Anor [2021] QCATA 57

PARTIES:

JULIE FROST

(applicant/appellant)

v

OFFICE OF THE QUEENSLAND OMBUDSMAN

(first respondent)

OFFICE OF THE INFORMATION COMMISSIONER
(second respondent)

APPLICATION NO:

APL206-20

MATTER TYPE:

Appeals

DELIVERED ON:

5 May 2021 (ex tempore)

HEARING DATE:

5 May 2021

HEARD AT:

Brisbane

DECISION OF:

Justice Daubney, President

ORDERS:

1.    Leave is granted for all necessary extensions of time for the filing of the application for leave to appeal or appeal.

2.    The application for leave to appeal or appeal is dismissed.

CATCHWORDS:

APPEAL AND NEW TRIAL – APPEAL – GENERAL PRINCIPLES – RIGHT OF APPEAL – WHEN APPEAL LIES – OTHER CASES – where appellant applied to first respondent for access to certain documents – where access to some documents were granted and some documents refused – where appellant applied to second respondent for external review of first respondent’s decision – where second respondent slightly varied first respondent’s decision but otherwise refused access to documents – where appellant filed in the Tribunal an application for leave to appeal or appeal the second respondent’s decision – where appeal must be on error of law – where extension of time for filing of appeal application granted – where appeal application fails to identify error of law – where appellant seeks relief beyond the jurisdiction of the Tribunal – whether leave to appeal or appeal ought be granted   

Information Privacy Act 2009 (Qld), s 43, s 65, s 132

O52 and Queensland Ombudsman [2020] QICmr 31

APPEARANCES & REPRESENTATION:

Applicant:

No appearance

First Respondent:

Second Respondent:

R Berry (counsel), with E Fletcher, instructed by Crown Law

T Lake (solicitor) i/b Office of the Information Commissioner

REASONS FOR DECISION

1. On about 9 March 2019, the Appellant, Julie Frost, applied to the First Respondent, the Queensland Ombudsman, under s 43 of the Information Privacy Act 2009 (Qld) (“IP Act”) for access to certain documents described as:

   All documents including emails about me or my complaints including consultations, calendar entries, minutes, include all text plus emails to or from the following: … especially seeking consultations and communications with [the Office of the Health Ombudsman].

2. On 30 April 2019, the First Respondent decided under s 65 of the IP Act to grant access to 205 pages, refuse access to 198 pages, and grant access to part of 71 pages.

3. Then, on 1 May 2019, the Appellant applied to the Second Respondent, the Information Commissioner, for external review of that decision by the First Respondent.

4. On 11 June 2020, the Second Respondent published a decision which had the effect of varying the First Respondent’s decision.  The Second Respondent’s decision is O52 and Queensland Ombudsman.[1] The Second Respondent’s decision varied the First Respondent’s decision to reflect an agreement by the First Respondent to release parts of three pages that had initially been refused in the First Respondent’s decision.  The Second Respondent’s decision otherwise refused access to the information sought and affirmed the decision that had been made by the First Respondent.

   [1][2020] QICmr 31.

5. On about 15 July 2020, the Appellant then filed an application for leave to appeal or appeal in this Tribunal.  I note, in passing, that strictly speaking the application for leave to appeal or appeal was filed several days after the prescribed time limit for the filing of such an application.  It is not suggested, however, that any prejudice has been suffered by either the First or Second Respondent by that minor delay and accordingly, to the extent that it is necessary, I grant all necessary extensions for the filing of the application for leave to appeal or appeal.

6. The fundamental difficulty with the application for leave to appeal or appeal is twofold.  Firstly, it fails to properly identify or articulate the error of law which the Appellant contends infects the decision sought to be appealed.  Secondly, the application seeks a range of relief, most if not all of which is completely beyond the jurisdiction of this Tribunal. For example, the prayer for relief asks for orders of damages, and the publication by the Tribunal of recommendations “to address systemic mobbing, class-based abuse [and] persecution by the state.” It also purports to seek an order that the Tribunal compel the publication of an apology with full admissions. 

7. To the extent that the application for leave to appeal or appeal sets out grounds of appeal, the absence of any proper grounds of appeal can be gleaned simply by recitation of the content of the Appellant’s application in which she says:

   Error of law, bias, apprehended bias, several years of human rights & PID reprisal complaints against both respondents & decision makers including multiple complaints upheld by QHRC against the same respondents. Missing PID records, claims that PID & complaints upheld by QHRC & shown in video & IP records given to the respondents are untrue – serious fraud, maladministration, cover-up, opaque deliberately misleading process for uniformly adverse decisions based on prior human rights & PID complaints, fail to consider limits of QCAT disclosure …

   The purported “Grounds of Appeal” also make allegations of cover-up and retaliation to “conceal crimes of cronies.”

8. On 23 October 2020, the Appellant, in accordance with directions which had been made by the Tribunal for the orderly progress of this matter, filed written submissions.  I have had regard to those written submissions.  I have also had regard to the written submissions provided by both the First Respondent and the Second Respondent. 

9. I note that the First Respondent, in the comprehensive and very helpful submissions prepared by Counsel, has sought to make sense of the Appellant’s written submissions by seeking to tease out from the Appellant’s submissions, the themes of complaint that she seeks to agitate. Those themes can be summarised as follows:

   (a)complaints by the Appellant about the conduct of the “Judge”, being a reference to QCAT decision makers, including me;

   (b)complaints about the way in which the Appellant’s previous complaints concerning lack of access to information have been, from her perspective, dealt with in a completely unsatisfactory way;

   (c)the fact that the Appellant was required to pay a filing fee for the filing of her application for leave to appeal or appeal in this Tribunal;

   (d)complaints about the way in which other proceedings to which the Appellant is a party have been conducted before this Tribunal, and generally in relation to her dealings with the parties in those other matters; and

   (e)complaints about the Appellant having a lack of understanding as to the basis upon which decisions are being made because she cannot see certain information in the documents that have been released. 

10. I accept the submission by Counsel for the First Respondent that these submissions appear to relate to particular findings of fact made by the Second Respondent in the review decision, but do not go to any particular questions of law.

11. The Appellant concludes her submissions with a general raft of complaints of maladministration, corruption, and misconduct by a variety of government agencies.  Her complaints in this regard are summarised in paragraph 34 of her written submissions where she says:

    My experience is of ‘across the board’ maladministration and corruption by Qld agencies and Bond University who have full access to police, hospital and QHRC powers and records by the financial incentives to high level state authority office holders.

12. It is not necessary for me to make any commentary on the tendentious allegations made by the Appellant in her submissions and, for that matter, in her application for leave to appeal or appeal. That is because an appeal against a decision of the Information Commissioner may only be on a question of law. So much is prescribed by s 132(2) of the IP Act.

13. As I have already said, notwithstanding the broad-brush allegations of, amongst other things, dissatisfaction, corruption and maladministration, the application for leave to appeal or appeal and the Appellant’s written submissions conspicuously fail to grapple with the necessary task which must be undertaken in pursuing an appeal under s 132 of the IP Act. She has simply not identified any error of law committed by the Information Commissioner in reaching the subject decision.

14. In those circumstances, there is a complete absence of merit in the application for leave to appeal or appeal. 

15. The application for leave to appeal or appeal will therefore be dismissed.