Worker challenging his registration wins access to the CCTV the decision-maker relied on (TASCAT, 2026)

What happened

The applicant held a registration to work with vulnerable people under the Registration to Work with Vulnerable People Act 2013 (Tasmania). On 26 June 2025 a delegate of the Registrar decided to impose a conditional registration on him. The decision concerned an incident involving a young person at Ashley Youth Detention Centre that was captured on CCTV. He had been charged over the incident, but on his account the criminal matter was withdrawn by Tasmania Police in January 2025. In November 2025 he applied to the tribunal for a review of the Registrar's decision.

In December 2025 the Registrar applied for orders protecting certain documents from disclosure, and for parts of the review to be heard without the applicant and his representative present. The tribunal ordered the Registrar to file the documents it wanted protected along with an index, and both sides filed written submissions. After a hearing in March 2026, four groups of material were still in dispute: CCTV footage (document 3), pages 29 to 35 of document 4, pages 59 to 63 of document 8, and pages 117 to 136 of document 16. Further submissions were filed and the matter came back in April 2026.

The tribunal had also asked the Registrar to find out whether Tasmania Police had already given some of these documents to the applicant or his former lawyers in the criminal case. The Registrar replied that it held no document that would tell the tribunal, that the Act gave it no power to make that enquiry, and that the direction went beyond the tribunal's jurisdiction. The tribunal rejected that position. It pointed to section 52A(1) of the Act, which lets the Registrar require information from another body, and to its own powers under the tribunal's Act, including the duty of a decision-maker to use its best endeavours to help the tribunal.

The Registrar's own reasons for the registration decision, dated 17 October 2025, said that the CCTV footage was the only impartial evidence available, that it had been weighted heavily, and that the applicant's account of the incident was rejected in preference to conclusions drawn from watching the footage.

What each side wanted

The Registrar argued the documents were protected under section 53(7) of the Act: that releasing the CCTV would endanger the emotional or psychological safety of the young people and staff in it, and would disclose information held for intelligence purposes; that the police material had been gathered, collated or created for investigation and intelligence; that the police papers were for the applicant to obtain from Tasmania Police directly; and that a prosecution could still be restarted. It also said a written summary of the footage already given to the applicant dealt with any fairness concern. The applicant argued the Registrar carried the onus of showing that one of the listed grounds applied to each document, that there was no live criminal proceeding, that he already knew who was involved and how the conduct was investigated, and that if the Registrar relied on the safety or intelligence grounds it had to put forward evidence showing that.

What the tribunal decided

The tribunal ordered that document 3, the CCTV footage, be disclosed, and that the Registrar allow the applicant and his representative an opportunity to view it on request. Pages 59 to 60 of document 8, and pages 117 to 118 and 120 to 130 of document 16, were ordered to be disclosed in full. Pages 61 to 63 of document 8 and pages 131 to 136 of document 16 were ordered to be disclosed subject to redactions identified by the tribunal.

Two items were withheld. Pages 29 to 35 of document 4 were not to be disclosed, under section 53(7)(c). Page 119 of document 16 was not to be disclosed, under section 53(7)(e).

The Registrar was given 14 days from the date of the order to comply. The tribunal also ordered that its reasons be published only to the parties, but that this restriction would lapse unless a party applied within 10 clear days for further anonymisation or specific redactions, with that application to be supported by written submissions and decided on the papers unless otherwise ordered.

Why the tribunal decided it that way

The starting point was procedural fairness, which means the right to know the case against you, including the evidence that affects you, and a fair chance to answer, contradict or correct it. The tribunal is required to promote natural justice and procedural fairness. That right can only be cut back where Parliament has clearly said so, in unmistakable and unambiguous language. The tribunal accepted that section 53(7) does modify procedural fairness, because it plainly allows the Registrar and the tribunal to rely on information the applicant cannot see. But the section does not make material protected just because it came from Tasmania Police.

Much turned on the word "intelligence" in section 53(7)(e). The Act defines "criminal intelligence information" elsewhere, for a different purpose, and Parliament did not use that defined phrase in section 53(7). So "intelligence" takes its ordinary meaning: information purposefully collected and analysed for a strategic purpose to address breaches or possible breaches of the law. CCTV footage was not that. Nor were the police papers that set out the allegations and the evidence against the applicant: those were produced for a prosecution, there could have been no expectation of confidentiality in them apart from witnesses' personal details, and it was unrealistic to now call them intelligence. No affidavit or other evidence was put forward to show they had been gathered for intelligence purposes.

On the safety ground in section 53(7)(d), the applicant appears in the footage and would already know who else was present, so the tribunal found it hard to accept that showing it to him would endanger anyone's safety or increase the likelihood of harassment, and no evidence was offered to support the claim. The tribunal accepted that releasing the footage to the general public could affect the young people in it, and it kept in mind that under section 7B the safety, welfare and protection of vulnerable people is the paramount consideration at all times. That risk was managed by letting the applicant and his representative view the footage rather than keep a copy, which is not the same as public access.

The tribunal also rejected the argument that a written summary was enough. A description of footage is not the same as watching it, particularly where the Registrar had treated the footage as the only impartial evidence and weighted it heavily when rejecting the applicant's account. For the parts that were withheld or redacted, the tribunal was satisfied the material fell within section 53(7)(c), which covers disclosure of methods or procedures for detecting or investigating breaches of the law, or section 53(7)(e), and it noted that section 53(7) stops the tribunal from revealing that information even in its reasons.

What this means if you are in a similar position

If you are in a similar position, this decision shows how a tribunal approaches a request to review a government decision when the agency wants to keep the evidence from you. The general rule is that you are entitled to know the material relied on against you. Where an Act allows information to be withheld, the agency has to show that a listed ground actually applies to each document, and the tribunal will look at what the document really is rather than where it came from. Statements that disclosure would endanger someone, or that material is "intelligence", generally need evidence behind them.

The decision also shows that withholding is not all or nothing. A tribunal can order that some pages go out in full, some go out with redactions, and some stay protected, and it can allow sensitive material such as footage to be viewed rather than copied so that other people's privacy is still looked after. And where a decision-maker leans heavily on one piece of evidence, a written summary of that evidence may not be treated as a fair substitute for seeing it.

In this kind of dispute, most people start by putting a clear written request to the agency for a copy of their own file and the material the decision relied on, keeping a record of what was asked for and what came back, before lodging an application for review with the tribunal.

How to apply: our step-by-step guide to a TASCAT application. More decisions: TASCAT cases and other civil disputes.

Source: KTU v (Delegate of the Registrar) Registration of Working with Vulnerable People [2026] TASCAT 115 (read the full decision). This summary was prepared from the published decision for general information. It is not legal advice, and the tribunal’s own reasons are the authoritative record.