New Zealand’s Chief Ombudsman, John Allen, has today published his half-yearly data on Official Information Act (OIA) and Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act (LGOIMA) complaints.
The data covers the number of complaints received under each Act from 1 January to 30 June 2025, as well as the number of complaints completed by the Ombudsman during this period.
The number of complaints about the way government agencies handle OIA requests has continued to rise year on year. However, in the most recent six-month period, there was a slight decrease in complaints compared to the previous half year (1,025 complaints, down from 1,029 in the previous half year).
The top three types of OIA complaints related to refusals in full (260, down from 315), partial refusals (258, up from 198), and delays in making a decision (210, up from 208). We also received a number of complaints about incomplete or inadequate responses (96, up from 94).
Of the total received, 794 were from individuals (up from 752), 113 from media (down from 131), 54 from companies, associations, incorporated societies or collectives (down from 55).
There were 251 complaints made under LGOIMA, up from the previous six-monthly period when 215 complaints were received.
Of the 251 LGOIMA complaints received, 209 were from individuals (up from 192), 20 from companies, associations, incorporated societies or collectives (up from nine), and 14 from the media (up from 13).
The top four types of LGOIMA complaints were refusals in full (66, consistent with last year), refusals in part (52, down from 54), delays in making decisions (53, up from 34), and inadequate or incomplete responses (47, up from 36).
The data does not enable a direct comparison between agencies, as complaints data on its own does not give the full picture. The number of complaints received by the Ombudsman may be a very small proportion of the total number of OIA or LGOIMA requests received by an agency, the Office said in a statement.
