Red Alert

Talking about open govt

Posted by on November 18th, 2011

Grant and I had a few things to say outside parliament today as we announced the release of Labour’s Open Government policy.

Not a flash PR video. Just a couple of real pollies telling you how we want things to be. The Labour way.


7 Responses to “Talking about open govt”

  1. Whaleoil says:

    Well done you two. Agree on official paper releases.

    What is your stance on opening up Parliamentary Services to the OIA though?

  2. Mark says:

    What do you think of United Future’s idea for independent costing of campaign promises?

    (I don’t mean that to take a dig at Goff’s inability to produce numbers)

  3. Steelykc says:

    Great stuff. I wish this was getting front news headlines. This is the way for governments of the future. Keep it going.

  4. Chris says:

    Great, but release of all Cabinet papers after a decision is made is fine, for example how budget papers are released. A thing to think about, though, is that as standard practices develop so will a greater amount of screening – a kind of “this will keep ‘em happy” attitude tends to emerge. Treasury releasing background budget papers is a case in point – Treasury’s voluntary releases of budget papers are often sanitised. There’s also the problem of withholding information under the “advice to ministers” proviso simply on the basis that a decision hasn’t been made. Decisions made in a blanket fashion, purely because a policy decision hasn’t been made bring errors because often information used in policy development can still be official information therefore doesn’t fall within the exception under the OIA.

    These are just examples. Are you going to invite specific input into your open government policy, in line with the policy itself? Will you be consulting the Office of the Ombudsmen to get their views on things?

  5. David says:

    It’s a bit wishy washy, like the general direction but you need to grow a bit of a spine as far as the politicians go. be good lot see national standards published too.
    bit sad about he Roy Morgan poll tonight, roll on 2014.

  6. John W says:

    A week in politics……………..

  7. Curious says:

    So this is a change from the Clark era? Or am I reading too much into this?

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