Information Publication Scheme Agency Plan

Information Publication Scheme Agency Plan

Purpose

Export Finance Australia (EFA) is established under the Export Finance and Insurance Corporation Act 1991 (Cth).

Export Finance Australia is required to comply with the Information Publication Scheme (IPS) requirements of the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (Cth) (FOI Act).

The IPS requires us to publish certain information on our website and to prepare an IPS Plan (Plan).

This Plan describes how we comply with, and how we have implemented and administer, the IPS.

Objectives

Our objectives in relation to this Plan are to ensure statutory compliance by outlining appropriate procedures to:

• manage our IPS information holdings
• identify and publish all information required to be published
• identify and publish optional information where we consider it appropriate to do so
• review IPS information holdings on a regular basis and ensure they are accurate, up-to-date and complete
• ensure information published under the IPS is easy to locate, understandable, machine readable and re-useable
• ensure satisfactory compliance with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (Version 2.0)
• monitor and assess our compliance with the IPS and this Plan
• consider feedback on our IPS approach and this Plan as appropriate.

Establishing and administering the IPS

Monitoring and assessing our compliance with the IPS and this Plan, and ensuring our FOI Disclosure Log remains up to date, is the responsibility of our Legal team. This will be conducted with the oversight of the General Counsel. Our Deputy General Counsel, Enterprise manages our IPS compliance and FOI obligations.

Each relevant business team is responsible for keeping our IPS information holdings accurate, up-to-date and complete. Our Brand and Communications team also ensures the relevant IPS information holding materials remain published and accessible on our website, and action website change requests where needed to update information.

To identify and respond to the IPS requirements, we review the FOI Act and relevant Information Commissioner guidance periodically as part of our review referred to in section 6 below. To identify information required or permitted to be published, we also periodically review our relevant website content to ensure it remains up to date, accurate, easy to locate, accessible and usable.

We do not charge for access to our IPS information holdings.

IPS information structure and accessibility

We publish the information required under the IPS in the Information Publication Scheme on our website. We also provide access to a range of other information on our website for public consumption and transparency.

We aim to ensure that information published on our website meets the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (Version 2.0) requirements. To the extent practicable, we will publish on our website information in HTML and PDF format. When this is not possible, we will provide the information in another format on request.
We also provide a search function on our website to aid accessibility.
 
Information can be downloaded or provided by email or in hard copy by post on request.

Information required to be published under the IPS

We publish information in accordance with section 8(2) of the FOI Act under the following headings:

• IPS Agency Plan
• who we are and what we do (which includes our Annual Reports and the information contained in those around organisational structure, our Board, our Board Audit and Risk Committee (BARC), and the Board and BARC Charters)
• our reports and responses to Parliament
• Freedom of Information Disclosure Log
• consultation arrangements
• contact us.

We will not publish any exempt matter  (consistent with sections 8 and 8C of the FOI Act) including information which is exempt under section 7 and Division 1 of Part II of Schedule 2 of the FOI Act.

Other information we may publish

Consistent with section 8(4) of the FOI Act we may publish other information on our website. For example, we publish certain information about the transactions we support on our Transactions Register.

Consistent with Section 5 and 6 above, the following summarises relevant information we publish on our website:

Information published on our website

Freedom of information
While we aim to be as transparent as possible regarding our operations, we are also legally required to protect our customers’ confidential information. We also operate in commercial markets where it is commonly required to provide contractual confidentiality undertakings in relation to customer and transaction information.

We are subject to the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (Cth) (FOI Act) but have a partial exemption reflective of our Export Finance and Insurance Corporation Act 1991 (Cth) confidentiality protections for customer and transaction information.

Our legislative and contractual confidentiality obligations are crucial for our customers – they expect and depend on our compliance with these obligations. Without the reassurance that we can keep commercial-in-confidence information confidential, the quality of information provided to us may be prejudiced. In turn, this could impair our ability to prudently make informed decisions on the risks of the transactions we are considering supporting. It could also lead to adverse project outcomes, competitive disadvantage for Australian exporters and financial losses for us.
Making a Freedom of Information Request
If you wish to make a Freedom of Information Request, you can do so by:
Post:
Attention: Export Finance Australia Freedom of Information Officer,
c/o General Counsel Level 11, 22 Pitt Street, Sydney NSW 2000.
Email:
foi@exportfinance.gov.au
 

Information Publication Scheme
Export Finance Australia is required to comply with the Information Publication Scheme (IPS) requirements of the FOI Act. The information we are required to publish, other than exempt material, is set out below:

Agency Plan
Our IPS Agency Plan  describes how we comply with the IPS requirements of the FOI Act.
Who we are and what we do

• • Details of our organisational structure, our purpose and objects, functions and powers, priorities, governance, finances and more are available in our most recent Annual Report. The Index of Statutory Requirements at the back provides a roadmap for easily finding these items.
  • Further information about our governance is set out here.
  • The Export Finance and Insurance Corporation Act 1991 (Cth) is our enabling legislation.
  • Further information about what we do is set out here.
  • Our purpose is also set out here.
  • Our organisational structure is also set out here.
  • Our Export Finance Australia Board members are set out here.
  • Our Executive members are set out here.
  • Our Board Charter is set out here.
  • Our Board Audit and Risk Committee Charter is set out here.
  • The current Statement of Expectations issued to us by the Minister for Trade and Tourism and the Minister for Finance and our Statement of Intent in reply are set out here.
  • Our Transaction Register is here. We publish information about the transactions we support within 8 weeks of signing, in accordance with our Statement of Expectations.

Our reports and responses to Parliament

• • Our Annual Reports.
  • Our Corporate Plan.
  • Senate Order on Entity Contracts reporting.
  • Statutory appointments - details of our Board are included here and in our most recent Annual Report.

Freedom of Information Disclosure Log

• • Our Freedom of Information Disclosure Log.

Consultation arrangements

• • We are not a policy advisory body and as such do not have associated consultation arrangements.
  • We do however invite public feedback on our potential involvement in transactions associated with any project that has potential for significant adverse environmental and/or social impacts (Category A project), including access to the project’s environmental and social impact assessment. This page can be found here. Through that page, you can register your interest in receiving an email notification when new transactions are placed on the register.

Contact us
For assistance in accessing information held by us, you can contact us using the details set out under ‘Making a Freedom of Information Request’ above.

IPS Compliance Review

Our Legal team internally reviews this Plan periodically, and at least every three years, to ensure we continue to comply with the IPS requirements in the FOI Act. This will be conducted with the oversight of the General Counsel.

In addition, section 9(1) of the FOI Act requires agencies to complete a review of the operation of the IPS within their agency, as appropriate from time to time and within five years of the commencement of the IPS, in conjunction with the Information Commissioner. We will participate in conjunction with the Information Commissioner, in such reviews.

To manage the review function, the Information Commissioner conducted the first survey of agencies’ compliance with IPS obligations in June 2012. Subsequent surveys were conducted in 2018 and 2023. The surveys allow tracking of changes in agency compliance levels over time. The Information Commissioner considers that the completion and submission of the IPS agency survey satisfies an agency’s obligation to complete a review of the operation of the IPS. We participated in the 2018 and 2023 surveys.

Feedback or questions about this Plan can be provided by email to foi@exportfinance.gov.au.

Definitions

The following definitions apply when used in this Plan:

FOI Act means the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (Cth).

IPS Information Holding means information published or to be published under the IPS.