The Supreme Court dismissed the Information Commissioner’s appeal over a father’s request for his daughter’s hospital records, holding that the Commissioner had applied the wrong test to the request under the Freedom of Information Act 1997. It remitted the matter to the Commissioner to reconsider under the correct approach and in light of the daughter’s circumstances and views. The court did not itself order that the records be released.
The father, identified in the judgment as N. McK., sought the records after his daughter was admitted to a Dublin hospital in January 2000. She was then a minor. He said he had been told she had an unspecified viral infection but could not obtain further information. He was her father and a joint guardian, alongside his late wife’s brother and the brother’s wife, who opposed disclosure.
The Commissioner had refused access, reasoning that where guardians disagreed, release should be directed only if there was tangible evidence that it would serve the child’s best interests. The High Court allowed the father’s appeal, finding that a parent’s decisions were presumed to be in a child’s interests unless evidence rebutted that presumption. The Commissioner appealed to the Supreme Court.
In its January 2006 judgment, the Supreme Court agreed with the High Court’s interpretation. It held that a parent is generally presumed to be entitled to medical information about a child, so the Commissioner had erred by requiring the father to provide tangible evidence that disclosure would benefit his daughter. That presumption is not absolute: evidence that access would not be in the child’s best interests may be considered, with her welfare paramount.
The court also stressed the effect of delay. The request concerned a hospital stay six years earlier, and the daughter, born in May 1988, was then in her 18th year. Her wishes had become highly relevant. The court therefore sent the request back to the Commissioner for review using the correct test and considering all the circumstances, including her views. The records’ eventual release remained undecided.