Newspaper viewed blackened out sections by holding documents up to a light source

Last week the Irish Times ran a story on the planned rail projects for Dublin, the story was based on Freedom of Information request made nearly two years ago.

While the request was filed a day after the transport plan ‘Transport 21′ was launched the Irish Times only received some of the documents the week before last, the newspaper says that every figure, particularly cost estimates, were blacked out.

Delays were due to denials for the fulfillment of requests by the Department of Transport, along with backlogs at the Office of the Information Commissioner.

Commercially sensitive or politically  sensitive?

In the an article on Tuesday the newspaper said that reasons citied
by the department centre around claims that the releases "could
reasonably be expected to result in a material financial loss or gain"
as the information is "commercially sensitive".

In an editorial the next day, the Times said,
"Whatever about the sensitivities associated with public-private
partnership (PPP) projects, the public is entitled to know, at least in
ballpark terms, what major pieces of infrastructure are likely to cost.
It is wrong for the Government to keep taxpayers in the dark".

In recent years the government has come under the spotlight from
both the media and opposition parties for overspend on large scale
transport developments such as the Luas tram system, the Dublin Port
Tunnel, and other projects. Original estimates were far surpassed
leading to suggestions in many cases that such infromation is
politically sensitive rather then commercially sensitive.