NationStates Jolt Archive

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (F.O.I.A)

ADDRESSING ALL UN MEMBER NATIONS;

RECOGNIZING the need to foster democracy by ensuring public access to government agency RECORDS and INFORMATION in all member nations;

MAXIMIZING the usefulness of agency records and information collected, maintained, used, retained, and disseminated by the Governments of member nations;

OBSERVING that the F.O.I.A is a valuable means through which any person can learn how their Government operates;

UNDERSTANDING that the F.O.I.A will lead to the DISCLOSURE of waste, fraud, abuse, and wrongdoing in the member Governments;

AWARE that the F.O.I.A will lead to the identification of unsafe consumer products, harmful drugs, and serious health hazards;

TAKING NOTE that government agencies increasingly use computers to conduct agency business and to store publicly valuable agency records and information;

RECOMMENDING that member government agencies should use NEW TECHNOLOGY to enhance public access to agency records and information.

IN ADDITION The F.O.I.A is to provide for public access to information in an electronic, or otherwise COMPUTER ACCESSIBLE format.

CONCLUDING that without free dissemination of information to the public, government agencies are able to commit illegal and immoral acts and;

FURTHER CONCLUDING that these acts will have SEVERE CONSEQUENCES upon the public WITHOUT its KNOWLEDGE or UNDERSTANDING.


EACH UN Government agency shall make publicly available upon request, the following forms, records and shall uphold policies including;

(1) A DESCRIPTION and INDEX of major information and record locator systems maintained by the agency; and

(2) FINAL OPINIONS, including CONCURRING and DISSENTING opinions, as well as orders, made in the adjudication of cases, and;

(3) RECORDS shall be provided by agency WITHOUT ANY CHARGE.

EXEMPTIONS--The F.O.I.A shall provide access to government agency records (or parts of those records) except those protected from release by FIVE SPECIFIC EXEMPTIONS.

(1)(A) Documents and records specifically authorized under criteria established by a Government order to be KEPT SECRET in the interest of NATIONAL DEFENSE or FOREIGN POLICY and (B) are in fact PROPERLY CLASSIFIED pursuant to such Government order;

(2) Related solely to the internal personnel rules and practices of an agency.

(3) Trade secrets and commercial or financial information obtained from a person and privileged or confidential;

(4) Personnel and medical files and similar files the disclosure of which would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy;

(5) Contained in or related to examination, operating, or condition REPORTS prepared by, on behalf of, or for the use of an agency responsible for the REGULATION or SUPERVISION of FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS.

--KROMM URGES ALL UN NATIONS TO ENDORSE AND ACTIVELY SUPPORT THE FREE DISSEMINATION OF INFORMATION.

Looks very well-written to me. I'll support it- but I'll bet there will be plenty of governments that like being able to keep things secret...

sure sure, and the govt reserves the right to classify anything it wants, as long as it uses the proper procedures, or the document is one of the 5 exceptions...

I believe this has been attempted before, and I actually was thinking of doing one a while ago, but there are many, many gray areas associated with this idea. I would be ready for a lot of attacks against the proposal. Good luck with it.

the nation of kromm also is the nation of Mephi once upon a time, but i assure you i am the one who submitted the original a few months ago...it has been revised and i nearly had enough support for it, back when the URL was switching over and there were NO forums...hopefully if enough people are posting it will get the attention it deserves.

could you site any examples of lack of clarity?

Well, according to the document, materials exempt under the FOIA have to meet two criteria to be validly classified anyway, "National Defense" and "Foreign Policy"... Regardless of the governmental mode, you are not going to get a nation to agree with an FOIA Resolution if it necessitates releasing classified materials to the public.

We commend the honourable member from Kromm in tabling a well written proposal. Whilst the Telidian government is still deciding whether to lend its support we do however have a comment to make on the following paragraph.

EACH UN Government agency shall make publicly available upon request, the following forms, records and shall uphold policies including;

This paragraph does not state to whom the information should/could be made available. Without it governments could argue compliancy simply by printing a transcript in a newspaper or making available information via the Internet.

In short, unless specific legal entities are empowered by this act to scrutinise or demand information we fear the proposal will be nothing more than a reference document with little or no legislative ‘teeth’.

Respectfully
Lydia Cornwall, UN Ambassador
Office of UN Relations, Dept for Foreign Affairs
HM Government of Telidia

If this resolution made it to vote..I may consider voting for it. Current policy in my nation states that documents that have no technologies that threaten the sanctity of the government can be released. If documents contain sensitive information, they are kept classified until their relevance passes. We also reserve the right to censor any material we release to an extent, i.e. names, references to other sensitive materials, locations, etc.

Good luck!

I don't see anything in here that prevents my enemies from requesting materials under the FOIA. Is that your intent? Can an enemy nation of 4 billion have their citizens legally request copies of all my nation's unclassified and exempt documents? And I must provide them free of charge to each of them? Do you know that the paperwork necessary to ensure the safety of a single new pharmaceutical can fill three tractor-trailers - just for the non-classified non-medical records? Add in the clinical trials data and you're at 20 truckloads. Per drug.

I forsee a new type of attack - the paperwork blizzard - as enemies of UN nations demand billions upon billions of duplicate proposals, paralyzing the bureaucracy as they deal with the requests and ruining the economy with the demands for hard-copies.

Sorry, no.

i just realized being a newly established nation, i do not possess the 2 endorsements necessary to submit a proposal to the UN...could anyone help? i have also been revising to consider the constructive crit as well...thanks, more to come.

I am not by any means a dictator, nor does my Council rule TilEnca by fear and secrecy.

However - as other people have pointed out, there are a few issues that I have with this as regards letting my nation, and other nations, see how the people who they elected run it.

Which I will now detail :}


RECOGNIZING the need to foster democracy by ensuring public access to government agency RECORDS and INFORMATION in all member nations;


What about governments who don't want to foster democracy, preferring instead totalitarian rule?


MAXIMIZING the usefulness of agency records and information collected, maintained, used, retained, and disseminated by the Governments of member nations;


I think the agencies we collect them for find them very useful, without the need to spread them around the whole UN.


OBSERVING that the F.O.I.A is a valuable means through which any person can learn how their Government operates;


Or a social studies text book. Or - you know - asking their Councillor.


UNDERSTANDING that the F.O.I.A will lead to the DISCLOSURE of waste, fraud, abuse, and wrongdoing in the member Governments;


Ah - this is where you have me. What if I don't want people to know one of my Councillors made a mistake? (Honestly I would prefer to tell them the truth, but we come back to the totalitarian government style again, where what the leader says goes, with no questions)


AWARE that the F.O.I.A will lead to the identification of unsafe consumer products, harmful drugs, and serious health hazards;


This implies a certain lack of the faith in my current procedures, does it not? And quite honestly if we release a drug that has a minor side effect that would only effect one in one million people, do you not think that releasing this information to the general public, the vast majority of whom would not be affected by the drug, would cause panic and chaos and general fear and distress? Would it not be better to keep it secret for the good of the country?


TAKING NOTE that government agencies increasingly use computers to conduct agency business and to store publicly valuable agency records and information;


That's pretty much true. Except for all the archive stuff we have on paper filed away at the regional councils.


RECOMMENDING that member government agencies should use NEW TECHNOLOGY to enhance public access to agency records and information.


What if they can't afford new technology? Or aren't advanced enough to have it?


IN ADDITION The F.O.I.A is to provide for public access to information in an electronic, or otherwise COMPUTER ACCESSIBLE format.


So not only do I have to provide it, I have to pay someone to transcribe it all?


CONCLUDING that without free dissemination of information to the public, government agencies are able to commit illegal and immoral acts and;


Or governments can act in the way that is ACTUALLY best for their people, rather than what the people think is best.


FURTHER CONCLUDING that these acts will have SEVERE CONSEQUENCES upon the public WITHOUT its KNOWLEDGE or UNDERSTANDING.


Or we can do something that might not be approved of initially, but comes out okay in the end. Or we can do something that has to be done, however unpopular it might seem, and let the people vote us out at the next election.


EACH UN Government agency shall make publicly available upon request, the following forms, records and shall uphold policies including;


Availble to whom? The people of my nation, or of every nation? This proposal does not say who can ask for this. Is it UN members only? Or non-UN members who - by the way - would be under no obligation to let me look at their records.


(1) A DESCRIPTION and INDEX of major information and record locator systems maintained by the agency; and


Who gets to decide what "major information" is?


(2) FINAL OPINIONS, including CONCURRING and DISSENTING opinions, as well as orders, made in the adjudication of cases, and;


Cases? What cases? Are you talking about legal cases? And the deliberations that judges make? Or are you talking about governmental decisions leading to - say - a 5% tax increase? Or the closing of a swimming pool in one of the regions?

I am not completely sure what information it is that I am supposed to be disclosing :}


(3) RECORDS shall be provided by agency WITHOUT ANY CHARGE.


So I have to find the records, pay for someone to transcribe them, pay for the distribution of them, and I am not allowed to charge at all?
Do you have any idea what this is going to cost my government? And what other programs and spending plans I am going to have to cut back on to do this?
Still - I am pretty sure orphans don't need blankets. It's not like it gets below minus 20 in the winter.


EXEMPTIONS--The F.O.I.A shall provide access to government agency records (or parts of those records) except those protected from release by FIVE SPECIFIC EXEMPTIONS.


What about government recordS? Or is The Council of Ministers (the ruling body of my nation) an agency in itself?



(1)(A) Documents and records specifically authorized under criteria established by a Government order to be KEPT SECRET in the interest of NATIONAL DEFENSE or FOREIGN POLICY and (B) are in fact PROPERLY CLASSIFIED pursuant to such Government order;


So - just to be sure I understand this - if I were to classify all documents within the government and all of it's agencies as relating to National Defense (except those that relation to Foreign Policy of course) then I would not have to give out any of them to anyone? If that is the case then I feel an executive order coming on :}


(2) Related solely to the internal personnel rules and practices of an agency.


If this does apply to the government, then pretty much everything relates to the practice of government, and is therefore exempt. Also - and this is just about this exemption - what if someone wants to know how a disciplinary hearing against one of my Agency Employees went cause she accsued him of being racist? Surely that comes under internal personnel and practice rules, and so would be exempt?


(3) Trade secrets and commercial or financial information obtained from a person and privileged or confidential;


That could be pretty much anythying within the government. Council Meetings are held in private and everything said is confidential, unless published in the minutes of the meetings.


(4) Personnel and medical files and similar files the disclosure of which would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy;


So I can protect all the "off-shore investments" my Councilers make using public money, cause clearly that is a personal file, and thus exempt.


(5) Contained in or related to examination, operating, or condition REPORTS prepared by, on behalf of, or for the use of an agency responsible for the REGULATION or SUPERVISION of FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS.


So if a bank has committed large scale fraud and theft, that would be exempt?

Okay - I am done with the commentry on the proposal.

The thing is I am not a dictator, and my Council Members do not rule by fear or in secrecy. They do not conduct off-shore investments, and generally banks do not commit theft.
I do have a plan to help orphans come the winter, but that is not really the point I was trying to make.

Democracy should be open. And we publish the minutes of Council meetings. We also publish the opinions of the courts when they make rulings in cases. And all court cases are heard in public, so that there can be no accusastions of bias or impropriaty.

BUT Council Meetings are held in private. The judges deliberate in private. Because that is sometimes the only way it will work. If we have a vote in the Council Chamber, then all that is published is the result of the vote, so that no one outside of the room knows who voted on which side, and who abstained. Because that is the only way we can get things done sometimes. There are issues of such pressing importance, ones that divide the nation and it's people, that we can not possibly conduct them in the glare of the public eye. Under such circumstances it would be impossible to get a decision due to the public wrangling and the reactions of the press.

Democracy is not a perfect form of government - it gives the people what they want, not what they need. So sometimes the fifteen Council Members and I get in a room in private and decide on something, then present a united front to our people so they know that this is what we have decided.

I don't want to keep secret those things that should be made public. But there are things I truly believe should be kept private, and unless you can promise me that this proposal will not interfere in the way I run my government and my country, I will have to oppose it so that my government does not collapse in to anarchy.

the space provided to submit a proposal to the UN is not large enough to address all the issues a totalitarian, or any other corrupt governing body, sees wrong with it. governmet IS the people, we learn about OURSELVES through the government. GOVERNMENTAL TRANSPARENCY is a great way to improve the quality of life for millions of UN citizens... get a life.

KROMM

GOVERNMENTAL TRANSPARENCY is a great way to improve the quality of life for millions of UN citizens... get a life.
... and with that sort of attitude, you just lost all chance of my support.


Act like a diplomat, be treated like a diplomat. Act like a spoiled brat, be prepared to have your otherwise good ideas ignored.

the space provided to submit a proposal to the UN is not large enough to address all the issues a totalitarian, or any other corrupt governing body, sees wrong with it. governmet IS the people, we learn about OURSELVES through the government. GOVERNMENTAL TRANSPARENCY is a great way to improve the quality of life for millions of UN citizens... get a life.

KROMM

I have a life. I just keep it in a box so it doesn't get dirty.

And my point is there are a fair amount of UN members out there who run totalitarian dictatorships, and are not going to support this proposal because it would weaken their power.

Plus Government is not the people. Government is those who the people have chosen to govern.