Information about the financial health of the FVLB during the Covid era
Marcus made this Official Information request to Department of Internal Affairs
Response to this request is delayed. By law, Department of Internal Affairs should normally have responded promptly and by (details and exceptions)
From: Marcus
Dear Department of Internal Affairs,
I would like to make a request for the following bits of information, where they exist:
- Any and all information regarding the financial status and/or continued viability of the Film and Video Labelling Body (referred to as FVLB hereafter) from 2019 until Present, including but not limited to:
- Any monthly/quarterly/yearly reports that provide a status update on the Film and Video Labelling Body's financial health and/or ability to continue operations
- Any correspondence (email, SMS etc) discussing the "Material Uncertainty Related to Going Concern" note included in the FVLB's 2019 and 2020 financial statements, which were prepared by William Buck Audit (NZ) Limited
- Any correspondence (email, SMS etc) noting the apparent absence of the material uncertainty disclaimer from the FVLB's financial statements for 2021 and onward, which is when the DIA funding period appeared to start.
- Any correspondence (email, SMS etc) regarding the decision by the DIA to provide ongoing funding to the FVLB, which began from 2021
- A copy of any contract(s) regarding DIA funding for the FVLB which began from 2021
- Any ministerial briefings prepared for the Minister of Internal Affairs regarding the FVLB's financial health and/or ability to continue operations. For reference, I believe this would have been any briefings for the following ministers across the requested period:
- Tracy Martin (2017 - 2020)
- Jan Tinetti (2020 - 2023)
- Barbara Edmonds (2023)
- Brooke van Velden (2023 - Present)
While I've tried to be pretty specific with the scope of what I'm interested in, I realize that this still may be a large amount of information to request so I'm happy to discuss any further refinements in scope and/or potentially offsetting the cost of labour needed (depending on the cost of course)
Yours faithfully,
Marcus
From: Marcus
Dear Department of Internal Affairs,
I was hoping to get confirmation that you've received my OIA about the FVLB?
Yours faithfully,
Marcus
From: minadviceteam
Department of Internal Affairs
Tēnā koe Marcus,
Thank you for your request under the Official Information Act 1982 (the Act) to Te Tari Taiwhenua | the Department of Internal Affairs.
We will provide a response to your request as soon as practicable and within 20 working days. The 20th working day is 12 March 2025.
Please note that in cases where our response provides information that is identified to be of general public interest, the response may also be published on our website. If we publish the response to your OIA request, all personal information, including your name and contact details, will be removed.
Ngā mihi,
Ministerial and Official Correspondence
Policy & Te Tiriti
Te Tari Taiwhenua | Department of Internal Affairs
45 Pipitea Street, Pipitea, Wellington 6011
Website| Facebook | LinkedIn
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From: minadviceteam
Department of Internal Affairs
Tçnâ koe Marcus,
Thank you for your email of 12 February 2025 to the Department of Internal
Affairs (the Department) requesting information about the Film and Video
Labelling Body (FVLB) under the Official Information Act 1982 (the Act).
We are emailing to invite you to refine the introductory part of your
request for “Any and all information regarding the financial status and/or
continued viability of the Film and Video Labelling Body (referred to as
FVLB hereafter) from 2019 until Present, including but not limited to”, as
well as to clarify on part one and refine part four of your request.
Introductory part
As it stands, the scope of your request covers a wide range and volume of
information, as it covers ‘any and all information…from 2019 until
present…’, including emails, and is not limited to the specific parts of
your request. This may result in a refusal of your request under section
18(f) of the Act, as the information requested cannot be made available
without substantial collation or research. One way to avoid refusing your
request would be for you to limit to the request to the bulleted matters
listed, to read as:
Information regarding the specific items listed below, relating to the
financial status and/or continued viability of the Film and Video
Labelling Body (referred to as FVLB hereafter)…
Limiting the request in this way would allow us to provide the information
of interest to you.
Part one
With respect to part one of your request, you are seeking “Any
monthly/quarterly/yearly reports that provide a status update on the Film
and Video Labelling Body's financial health and/or ability to continue
operations”. We wish to note that the Department received reports from
FVLB as part of its financial viability reviews in 2020 to 2022. Following
these reviews, the Department provided one-off funding in 2020 and 2021,
and ongoing funding to FVLB from 2023 to 2025.
We wish to clarify whether you are seeking the regular financial reports
submitted by FVLB to the Department during the period of 2020 to the date
of your request. We also wish to note these reports from FVLB are usually
monthly breakdowns of its annual reports. FVLB’s annual reports are
published as part of its obligations as a registered charity at:
[1]register.charities.govt.nz/CharitiesRegister/ViewCharity?accountId=083dcb5c-b4c8-dc11-8026-0015c5f3da29&redirectUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fregister.charities.govt.nz%2FCharitiesRegister%2FSearch%3FSubmitted%3DTrue%26CharityNameSearchType%3DContains%26CharityName%3Dlabelling%2Bbody.
Part four
With respect to part four of your request, you are seeking “Any
correspondence (email, SMS etc) regarding the decision by the DIA to
provide ongoing funding to the FVLB, which began from 2021”. We would need
to access the records of previous employees and run searches across a
number of inactive email accounts, as well as the records of current
staff. As it stands, this portion of your request is likely to involve
substantial collation or research and be refused under section 18(f) of
the Act.
To avoid refusing this portion of your request, we wish to invite you to
refine this part of your request. One suggestion for refinement is to
amend this portion of your request to “Any memos or official advice
regarding major decisions by the DIA in deciding to provide ongoing
funding to the FVLB, which began from 2020.” This refinement would capture
key decisions made regarding ongoing funding for FVLB to continue its
operations.
We would appreciate your response on the above matters by 11 March 2025.
Ngâ mihi,
Ministerial and Official Correspondence
Policy & Te Tiriti
Te Tari Taiwhenua | Department of Internal Affairs
45 Pipitea Street, Pipitea, Wellington 6011
[2]Website| [3]Facebook | [4]LinkedIn
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From: Marcus
Dear minadviceteam,
On second look, I agree that my original introductory wording is a bit too broad for what I'm interested in and so I'm happy to refine the introductory section down to the suggested wording:
> Information regarding the specific items listed below, relating to the financial status and/or continued viability of the Film and Video Labelling Body (referred to as FVLB hereafter)
Part 1 was mostly concerned with status reports compared to financial reports but in hindsight, I'll drop Part 1 as I think it should be sufficiently covered by Part 6 (Ministerial Briefings/Status Reports)
I note that you didn't mention Parts 2 and 3 as being too broad but they do have the same broad wording as Part 4. I'm happy to drop these two points if they are going to generate an excessive amount of work as well, as I don't think they'll result in any results.
I'm also happy to accept the suggested refinement for Part 4 being
> Any memos or official advice regarding major decisions by the DIA in deciding to provide ongoing funding to the FVLB, which began from 2020.
Thanks for the suggestions.
Yours sincerely,
Marcus
From: minadviceteam
Department of Internal Affairs
Tēnā koe Marcus,
Thank you for confirming your refinement and clarification.
Please find attached a letter in relation to your request.
The Department has extended the date for a response to your request by 25 working days to 16 April 2025.
We will endeavour to provide you with a response to your request earlier if possible.
Ngā mihi,
Ministerial and Official Correspondence
Policy & Te Tiriti
Te Tari Taiwhenua | Department of Internal Affairs
45 Pipitea Street, Pipitea, Wellington 6011
Website| Facebook | LinkedIn
show quoted sections
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Marcus left an annotation ()
I had sent a direct email earlier today at 2:25pm in order to confirm that my request had arrived and that there hadn't been a delivery failure
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