Official Information Act 1982

Purposes and criteria

5: Principle of availability

You could also call this:

"Information should be available to you unless there's a good reason to keep it secret"

When you ask for official information, the person deciding whether to give it to you must think about the purpose of the Official Information Act. They must also consider the idea that information should be available to you unless there is a good reason to keep it secret. You can find more about this in the Official Information Act, which is the law that guides how official information is shared.

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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=DLM65365.


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4: Purposes, or

"This law helps you get information to have a say and hold others accountable."


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6: Conclusive reasons for withholding official information, or

"When the Government can keep official information secret to protect New Zealand"

Part 1Purposes and criteria

5Principle of availability

  1. The question whether any official information is to be made available, where that question arises under this Act, shall be determined, except where this Act otherwise expressly requires, in accordance with the purposes of this Act and the principle that the information shall be made available unless there is good reason for withholding it.