Information Commissioner Timothy Pilgrim has ruled that poor record-keeping practices are no reason for the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) to charge exorbitant fees for a journalist’s FOI request.

The Australian newspaper had sought correspondence between ASIC and the National Australia Bank (NAB) following reports that ASIC had allowed NAB to check and alter one of the regulator’s press releases, to determine whether this was a one-off or a regular occurrence.