Ku-ring-gai Council v Garry West: recent decision

In the recent decision of Ku-ring-gai Council v Garry West as delegate of the Acting Director-General, Office of Local Government [2017] NSWCA 54, the NSW Court of Appeal considered the question of whether the public interest in the production of documents outweighed the public interest in preserving secrecy and confidentiality.

The matter concerned a judicial review application and considered the question of whether the primary judge was correct in upholding a claim of public interest immunity to the production of documents recording analyses of the financial advantages and disadvantages of a merger proposal which documents were prepared by consultants but submitted to Cabinet.