Editorial: Privacy law must not block right to know

Back in history, minor offences against society were dealt with in the most public of ways. Petty criminals were held in pillories or stocks set up in marketplaces or at crossroads. In modern times, the approach has become more sophisticated, but always the intention is for courtrooms to be open. Why, then, could the police have even contemplated stopping the release to the news media of lists of those convicted of drink-driving?

Those lists are customarily received from the police via fax or email. In practice, it means media outlets do not have to send reporters to record relatively mundane and sometimes lengthy court proceedings. But under an edict from the police, having staff present would be the only means of gaining information on such convictions. The police and the Justice Ministry attributed the change to the Privacy Act. Police national headquarters said it had legal advice that the information was not its to supply. The ministry, for its part, said that, beyond the public gaze of the courtroom, the act gave an individual's right to privacy precedence over the right of media to personal information held by the court.

The edict and such nonsensical thinking have been shelved within days of being subjected to public scrutiny. Police Minister Judith Collins was, quite rightly, scathing in her criticism, saying they protected "potential killers". Worse still, they betrayed a penchant for secrecy, allied with a notion that charges the media with something verging on voyeurism. Whatever the eventual backdown, the initial instinct of the police and the ministry was to fly in the face of justice being administered in public. So absurd was this that not even the Privacy Commissioner wanted anything to do with it. Marie Shroff noted that her office had not received any complaints from people named in the drink-driving lists.

Another strand of the restriction was that it hampered police traffic units, which consider publication of the names of those convicted a tool in preventing drink-driving. Such naming and shaming has always been integral to the open administration of justice, supplying what the Police Minister suggested was a deterrent to crime. Any misguided application of the Privacy Act completely undermines this. Drink-driving would have become, as one senior police officer put it, "an anonymous offence".

But the most alarming aspect of this thwarted attempt to restrict the supply of information is that it is not an isolated incident. Other information that should be freely available to the public has become more difficult to obtain. Take access to birth, death and marriage certificates. The previous Government, citing privacy concerns and identity fraud, went so far as to propose legislation that limited access to a person's own records, those of an immediate family member or someone born more than 100 years ago. In the end, better sense prevailed, but someone wanting to search for another person's information must now go on to a register and show identification. A similar, more restrictive, access regime has also been applied to details of vehicle ownership.

All this is part of a creeping process that threatens the freedom of information. In part, this may be prompted by a fear of technological innovations. More fundamental, however, is an ongoing and barely disguised desire to withhold information from the public for no good reason.

Freedom of information legislation has been only partly successful. Privacy law has provided a counterpoint that is all too often seized upon. Those ready to go down that path need to be reminded that matters of public record must be readily available to the public. There can be no ifs or buts.