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Saturday, October 11, 2014

Time for an OIA on underhanded dirty tactics by councils

Mr Nager's manager at the Northland Regional Council, Tess Dacre, learnt he had been in contact with Mr Pope and asked him for copies of the text messages. Mr Pope obliged, treating it as a request under the Official Information Act.

Mr Nager said he found out the NRC had obtained his text messages when he requested his personnel file.

"I thought, 'What's this?' I gave my ex-boss a call and it all unfolded from there. They (NRC) got my messages off someone else's phone. That's really underhanded. You don't expect that degree of snooping. I don't know what they were hoping to find."

Definitely underhanded tactics from the council overlords.  Even the toothless watchdog said so.

the Privacy Commissioner, who has ruled that the council breached the Privacy Act when it accessed text messages sent by Mr Nager in the days following the attack

Country wide, I wonder how many any other OIA "give us the dirt" requests have been made by one council of another local government entity in their quest to always show who's in control.  Must be a good topic for an OIA and would wager it could unearth extensive underhanded dirty politicking in the halls of local government. 

Anyone up for an OIA?


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