By convenor |

Previously, Autism Aspergers Advocacy Australia (A4) wrote to Attorneys-General about the rights of people with a disability (see http://a4.org.au/a4/node/438). The letter was emailed twice (once each on 4/1/2012 and 5/1/2012) and there was no indication that it did not arrive at its destination.

There was absolutely no response to the letter, so we put in a request using the Freedom of Information process. The response says:

... neither the Attorney-General's Office nor the Department appears to have any record of having received correspondence from you dated 4 January 2012.

The full "Freedom of Information" response can be downloaded using the link below.

So the Attorney-General's office either lost or ignored two copies of A4's letter.

In addition, the personal email to the Attorney-General (dated 19/1/2012) that is in the record also refers to the previous correspondence (see http://a4.org.au/a4/node/396 and http://a4.org.au/a4/node/438). The record of this email is marked "App. Action" on 24/1/2012 ... which apparently means "appropriate action", which turns out to be just "file and ignore".

Not all of PM Gillard's front bench supports reforms in the disability sector. Some, such as the Attorney-General, just ignore disability matters.

Attachment Size
20121005 FoI scanned.pdf (447.02 KB) 447.02 KB

The letter to the Attorney-General was resent on several occasions. As yet, the Attorney-General's office has not acknowledged receiving the letter. There is no indication that the Government will consider the very serious concerns raised.

Freedom of Information requests have now been sent asking for the relevant part of the electronic logs of email arrivals in both the aph.gov.au and ag.gov.au domains. We hope in this way to document that the emails did arrive in relevant people's email "in boxes".

It really should not be this hard to get a response from Government.