Tēnā koe,

On several previous occasions [1][2][3][4][5][6], NZ Police has released tactical options reporting (TOR) data under the Official Information Act for periods between 1 July 2016 and 31 December 2020.

The most recent TOR data released under the OIA, covering 1 January - 31 December 2020, was released in a spreadsheet format with some columns removed and some others recoded.

I understand that the decisions about which information to withhold and which information to recode were made in consultation with the Office of the Ombudsman, to reach a compromise that would satisfy the scope of my earlier request for TOR data covering 2018 in a way that was achievable by Police.

I understand that some cleaning of this data is typically done as part of the process of preparing the annual TOR summary reports. The summary report covering 2021 has not yet been published, and the publication of summary report covering 2020 was delayed so that it was not published until December.

However, RNZ reported on 19 September 2021 [7] that NZ Police said “the 2021 Tactical Options report is being quality checked and analysed”, which leads me to believe that the 2021 TOR data has likely been cleaned already. I hope that means this data cleaning work wouldn’t need to be pulled ahead of schedule in order to prepare the TOR data covering 2021 for release under the OIA.

Please release the following information:

1. TOR data for the 1 January - 31 December 2021 reporting period, in the same format as was released for the January - December 2020 reporting period (ref IR-01-21-29521).

Please also explain any relevant caveats that should be kept in mind when analysing this information.

Please provide all information, including the response letter, in an accessible, searchable format. Please provide the TOR data in a machine-readable format such as CSV or XLSX. I’d be happy if the XLSB format that has been used to release the data covering 2020 is used again.

If any part of my request is unclear, please don't hesitate to contact me.

Ngā mihi,
Mark Hanna

[1] 16/11336
[2] 16/7758/11
[3] IR-01-18-5190
[4] IR-01-20-34818
[5] IR-01-21-12630
[6] IR-01-21-29521
[7] https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/4750...

Tēnā koe,

Under section 15 of the OIA, NZ Police has a legal obligation to inform me of its decision on my request as soon as reasonably practicable, and in any case not later than 20 working days after the day on which it received my request.

That 20 working day legal deadline was 14 November 2022, which passed two days ago. Yet I have still not heard any more from NZ Police regarding this request since the acknowledgement I received on 17 October.

I have complained to the Ombudsman regarding this unlawful delay.

I have regularly requested tactical options reporting data from NZ Police for six years now, and this is the fifth time NZ Police has failed to communicate their decision to me on one of these requests within the prescribed legal timeframe.

I am aware that the Ombudsman has recently written to Police to draw attention to the requirement for timeliness under the OIA, as the result of my complaint to him regarding NZ Police's failure to meet those requirements in response to a separate OIA request.

I'm sure you can understand how frustrating it is that most OIA requests I make to NZ Police do not receive a response within the timeframe required by law. I am sure this is not a situation that NZ Police wants to find itself in, however it has a duty to uphold the law.

I am sure some progress must have been made on this request in the 22 working days since it was received. Please let me know when I can expect to receive NZ Police's decision.

Ngā mihi,
Mark Hanna

Tēnā koe,

Thank you for the response last week to my request.

I’ve gone back to check the 2020 TOR summary report again, and I didn’t see anything that talked about moving the recording of use of force information to a new tactical database. I couldn’t find the phrase “tactical database” anywhere on police.govt.nz either, or any mention of this new database in either of the last two annual reports, but I’d definitely be interested to learn more about this if there is a public resource you could direct me to where I could find out more.

I’d also appreciate it if you could give me some indication of when the TOR report covering 2021 is likely to have been produced. I know last year the TOR report covering 2020 wasn’t published until 2 December, and though NZ Police’s response to the OIA request I had made for the TOR data covering the same period was due on 1 December, the data wasn’t released until 10 December.

Part of my concern with waiting to re-request the data is that, if I were to wait until the TOR report covering 2021 has been published before I make a new request, a response might not be prepared until well into January or February 2023. If possible, I’d been hoping to have the data available for analysis over the new year.

I appreciate the suggestion that NZ Police would be happy to proactively release the data to me without needing another request. I’d love to see NZ Police proactively publish the TOR data on the NZ Police website, alongside the TOR report for the same period, if possible. Though if that option is not available, you can use the email address for this FYI request to release it to me.

Ngā mihi,
Mark Hanna