Both sides were claiming victory after the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal appeals panel ruled Newcastle City Council must hand over documents on the city’s Supercars race to Newcastle East Residents Group.
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The council turned to the appeals panel after the NCAT ruled in February that the residents group should be given access to four documents under freedom-of-information laws, but with dollar amounts redacted.
The council gave NERG redacted versions of its services deed with Supercars, details of which the Newcastle Herald has published in recent months, and a memorandum of understanding between Supercars, the council and Destination NSW.
But it applied to the appeals panel to block public access to parts of the documents, which also include a civil works agreement between the three parties and a Destination NSW letter formalising its relationship with the council.
The appeals panel largely rejected the council’s application this week, and the council posted all four documents, without dollar figures, on its website on Friday.
The council also issued a statement welcoming the appeals panel’s “decision” to “withhold financial details” of the Supercars agreements.
But the appeals panel’s decision makes it clear the residents had not contested the tribunal’s decision to keep the dollar amounts secret.
“The Residents Action Group has not appealed from the Tribunal’s decision to refuse to give access to the amount of funding,” the panel’s written ruling says.
An NERG spokeswoman said on Friday the “tribunal gave the residents all they asked – all the information that the first hearing ordered to make available to us”.
“The reason they didn’t grant us the dollars and cents was because NERG never asked for this information. We were prepared to accept the umpire’s decision first time around.”
The Environmental Defenders Office legal centre, which helped NERG with the matter, said the appeals panel had noted “that the law presumes there is public interest in disclosure and it is up to the council to provide evidence that there would be an adverse impact from the release of the information”.
Council CEO Jeremy Bath said his organisation was “committed to open and transparent governance”.
“We had already provided the vast majority of these documents to the Newcastle East Residents Group, but with the dollar amounts redacted,” he said.
“We have a legal and commercial responsibility to support commitments made to Supercars and Destination NSW almost two years ago regarding what was commercial in confidence and what was not.”
NERG is also seeking FOI access to a council report on Supercars costs.