As should be clear from the response [PDF] to my latest OIA request on the cycleway - the one which showed conclusively that the Prime Minister had lied to Parliament - there were actually some documents included. These were:
- An aide memoire [PDF] on the New Zealand Cycleway (26 May 2009), giving a quick progress update.
- A briefing to the Minister of Tourism and Kevin Hague of the Green Party, titled "New Zealand Cycleway" (3 June 2009), giving a progress report, details on the organisation of "regional clusters" of councils, and a project timeline.
- A briefing to the Minister of Tourism and Kevin Hague of the Green Party, titled "New Zealand Cycleway: Engagement with Local Government" (9 June 2009), giving further details on relations with those "regional clusters".
- A comprehensive briefing to the Minister and Associate Minister of Tourism and Kevin Hague of the Green Party, titled "New Zealand Cycleway: Report Back on Initial Projects and Actions to Date" (26 June 2009; too long to scan, sadly), seeking formal agreement from the Minister for the initial selection of "quick start" projects and reproducing and expanding on the information here [PDF].
None of these documents contain any cost-benefit analysis. The final briefing does contain information on the projected benefits of those projects - but the response cover-letter notes that this information "is not based on full feasibility studies, and... should not be viewed as conclusive". More importantly, without any information on the project costs, there is no way of judging whether they are an effective use of public money. And now that the Prime Minister has made a public commitment to those projects, we're stuck with them - without any real analysis ever being done.
What is most interesting about these documents is not their content, but how they are handled: apart from the Aide Memoire, every single one of them is classified "In Confidence". According to Cabinet guidelines, this should only be done where
Compromise of information would be likely to prejudice the maintenance of law and order, impede the effective conduct of government in New Zealand or affect adversely the privacy of its citizens.None of this applies in any way to this information (something made even clearer by the official DPMC classification guidelines). So why is it secret? Either ego, or good old-fashioned paranoid information control-freakery. But neither the Prime Minister's sense of self-importance or his desire to suppress public oversight and criticism is a good reason to classify this information. Instead, it is a waste of government resources, and an abuse of the security classification system.
