Two Ministry of Justice workers are in hot water for describing a researcher as a “bitch” in an online conversation.
Academic and author Barbara Sumner made a number of Official Information Act requests as part of her PhD research into the systems around adoption. Then, in October last year, she asked for all correspondence mentioning her by name.
“Because I had felt all along that there was a resistance to everything I sent in and you know, just the sort of snottiness, I guess, of some of the responses that came in that request. I wanted to understand how they were treating me throughout the process.”
One page of the response stood out among more than 100 others. A November 2022 Teams conversation between two staffers, whose names were redacted, complained about Sumner’s latest request.
They described it as “a waste of time” and said it “should have been refused on the ground of substantial collation” or that the ministry should “charge her for it and get a contractor”.
“our ministerial services team sucks cuz they wouldnt let us refuse, and helen didnt push back hard [sic],” one worker wrote.
"but also shes a bitch for wanting everything. does she think govt just has unlimited resources for this type of crap lol.
“like theres no public interest in our emails back and forward.”
She did the request for her own info because she suspected staff were dragging their heels with her other requests, and the request for her own info proved her suspicions were well-founded.
Asking for information on how a section of government operates should be commended, not discouraged. The government works for the people and their operations should be transparent. Doubly so when they act like they have something to hide.
But, Ive been a staff member who had a bad day and found a customer’s legitimate request frustrating - “this is the last thing I needed” - so I have some level of sympathy for the staffers too.
Yeah, I fully support government transparency and see the need for it. I guess I’ve only seen this from one side, which is the side where you’re being ask for this info but you’re unable to correct the media because you can’t give out personal information, so the media gets a one sided story.
I guess my main feeling was that the headline “Ministry of Justice workers call researcher a ‘bitch’ in online conversation” sounds really bad, but the sentence it’s used it to me feels a lot softer.
On the other hand, there’s really no excuse for a staff member whose job it is to respond to OIA and Privacy Act requests to not recognise that these chat conversations would be part of what is returned to her.