‘Getting Out Of Hand’: Personal Info Requests Costing Nelson Council

Tuesday, 4 March 2025, 8:22 pm
Article: Max Frethey - Local Democracy Reporter

Nelson City Council has had to hire a new staff member to cope with the number of personal information requests it's getting.

People are entitled to receive access to their personal information from the council if they request it, according to the Privacy Act's Information Privacy Principle 6 (IPP6).

However, a rise in the requests is putting pressure on the council due to the time it takes to compile all of an individual's information, which can include everything from dog registration payments to submissions.

Nelson mayor Nick Smith last week said the costs were "getting out of hand" and suggested the growing Sovereign Citizen movement was behind the rise.

Devorah Nicuarta-Smith, the council's manager for governance and support services, has handled several of the IPP6 requests.

She said the requests can take up to 7 weeks to fulfil despite a 20-working day timeframe specified within the act.

One of the more recent requests generated 127,000 search results in the council's systems.

Each result must be reviewed to determine its relevance to the request, and to see if any elements needed to be withheld or redacted, like when another individual's details are intertwined in the information.

"The biggest immediate cost is the staff time that's required for these, with the flow-on impacts that then there's other work that needs to be adjusted or pushed out," Nicuarta-Smith said.

The magnitude of work involved was exacerbated by an increase in requests over the last two years, prompting chief executive Nigel Philpott to create a new full time permanent role last year in the privacy area to help deal with the "growing issue" of the requests.

Nicky McDonald, the group manager strategy and communications, said the council does not have full records of privacy request numbers until 2019.

"But anecdotally they were relatively uncommon and quite simple in nature," she said.

"Since 2019, Council has had 16 privacy requests, which have coincided with a marked increase in their breadth and complexity."

The expansion of the council's activities and systems over the last six years has increased the demand on staff time to respond to the requests, she added, unearthing anything from "library book reserves to submissions on council consultations".

Unlike a Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act (LGOIMA) request where the council can charge for the work, the councils cannot do the same for IPP6 requests.

Mayor Nick Smith said the costs were "getting out of hand" and suggested the growing Sovereign Citizen movement was behind the increase when presented with the information during an Audit, Risk, and Finance Committee meeting last week.

He estimated that a single request effectively cost the council $10-12,000 in staff time.

Smith proposed writing a letter to the Minister of Justice about the costs and to seek an amendment to the Privacy Act to allow charging for the information at a reasonable rate.

"The Government is having us under pressure around rates pressures, the community is giving us the same message," he said.

"Yes, there is a right for a citizen to be able to have reasonable information about them, but I think there also has to be a balance as to the cost to every other ratepayer that is effectively having to fund these requests."

Smith's suggestion was welcomed by councillor Mel Courtney who described the proposal as "an excellent idea",

"It's called fairness across the board for the ratepayers. We just cannot let that continue."

McDonald said the council wanted to be helpful to residents requesting their personal information.

"If requests can be specific about the type of information they are seeking, staff can respond much more quickly. Staff are happy to sit with a requestor and help them design a request that will deliver exactly the information they need."

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