18 October 2021
Ref: OIA 2122-0842
Victoria Muninn
Email:
[FYI request #17087 email]
Tēnā koe Victoria
I refer to your email of 7 October 2021 to the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE)
requesting, under the Official Information Act 1982 (the Act), the following information:
“Please provide all communications since the 2017 general election with DLA Piper.”
It appears likely that your original request will need to be clarified to enable us to respond. Please note,
any clarification of a request is considered to be a new request for the purpose of calculating the
maximum statutory timeframe for response—see section 15(1AA) of the Act.
A preliminary search of MBIE’s financial records has indicated that MBIE has not paid DLA Piper since New
Zealand’s 2017 General Election.
Because we have not paid for their services, it is possible that the Ministry may refuse your request under
section 18(e) of the Act – that the information requested does not exist – unless you can word the
request in a way that would remove the reason for the refusal.
Further, due to the current broad wording of your request, and MBIE’s large size, if communications with
DLA piper did exist in the absence of MBIE paying for their services, those communications could lie with
any number of staff members. We would therefore like to seek the following points of clarification from
you:
Were you only interested in communications with DLA Piper that were related to
services MBIE paid for?
Was there any particular subject matter or area of interest that you had in mind
for the communications? (E.g. immigration; employment relations; building and
tencancy.)
If you are able to provide these clarifications to us on or by 5pm Thursday 21 October 2021, that would
be ideal. If we do not hear from you by then, we will proceed with the most obvious interpretation of
your request.
MBIE1376631
You have the right to seek an investigation and review by the Ombudsman. Information about how to
make a complaint is available at
www.ombudsman.parliament.nz or freephone 0800 802 602.
Nāku noa, nā
Ministerial Services
Engagement, Communications and Ministerial Services
Ngā Pou o te Taumaru