The Office of the Ombudsman has published its 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 July to 31 December 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. In the most recent six-month period,
there was an increase of 173 complaints compared to the
previous half year (1,198 complaints, up from 1,025 in the
previous half year).
The top three types of OIA
complaints related to refusals in full (322, up from 260),
delays in making a decision (280, up from 210), and partial
refusals (247, down from 258).
Of the total received,
953 were from individuals (up from 794), 121 from media (up
from 113), 55 from companies, associations, incorporated
societies or collectives (up from 54).
There were 322
complaints made under the LGOIMA, up from the previous
six-monthly period when 251 complaints were
received.
Of the 322 LGOIMA complaints received, 290
were from individuals (up from 209), 19 from the media (up
from 14), and 12 from companies, associations, incorporated
societies or collectives (down from 20).
The top four
types of LGOIMA complaints were refusals in full (87, up
from 66), refusals in part (87, up from 52), inadequate or
incomplete responses (53, up from 47), and delays in making
decisions (49, down from 53).
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Complaints data (1 July
– 31 December 2025)
Complaints
received
Complaint type Individual
Media Other Total received
LGOIMA 290 19 13 322 OIA
953 121 124 1,198
LGOIMA or OIA complaints received
may also be from: political party research units; trade
unions; special interest groups, companies, associations,
incorporated societies, Members of Parliament, etc. These
are categorised as ‘Other’ in this table. See this half
year data set for more detail.
Reasons for
complaints
Complaint type Delay in
decision Refusal in full Refusal in part Incomplete/
inadequate response Extension Other LGOIMA
49 87 87 53 15 31 OIA 280 322 247 102 71
176
The ‘Other’ category may include complaints
about decisions to make information available subject to a
charge; the manner or form in which information was
released; alleged delay in releasing information; extensions
of the time limit to making decisions on requests; refusal –
statement of reasons; refusal – internal rules and
guidelines; refusal – personal information about body
corporate. See this half year data set for more
detail.
Complaints completed
Complaint
type Individual Media Other Total
completed LGOIMA 333 28 29 390
OIA 1,253 151 156 1,560
About the data:
The data released
by the Ombudsman concerns both OIA and LGOIMA complaints
received and completed from 1 July to 31 December 2025. It
includes information on the number of complaints received by
Minister or agency, the nature of the complaint and type of
complainant (media, private individual, etc). For the
complaints completed, the data also includes the outcome of
the complaint.
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.
OIA
and LGOIMA complaints received between 31 July and 31
December 2025
Te Kawa Mataaho | Public Service
Commission publishes its own data on OIA requests received
by agencies and their response times on the same day as the
Ombudsman
publishes.
