The Information Commissioner received more 928 applications for reviews of Freedom of Information requests in 2018-19, an 80 per cent jump on the 510 applications received four years ago.

Of the 60 formal decisions made by the Commissioner, 37 were set aside and a new decision made, four were varied, and just 19 were affirmed. Two of the affirmations were revised during the review to grant greater access to the documents sought under FOI.

Another two of the affirmations involved the Information Commissioner agreeing a document should be released.

Commissioner Angelene Falk is moving to finalise more cases without formal decisions, with 599 reviews of the 659 resolving without a formal decision.

A further 76 cases were withdrawn after the agency said it would resolve the issues at hand, including by making more documents available.

While the Commissioner finalised more reports than the previous year, the office is still considerably overloaded, with applicants warned it could take more than six months to be assigned a review adviser.

READ MORE:

The annual report was tabled on the day media organisations throughout the country published newspapers with the front pages heavily redacted, in a bid to highlight the lack of transparency in government agencies.

Along with five other demands, media agencies are seeking to reform federal Freedom of Information laws in order to reduce and restrict delays, reduce costs and exemptions that obstruct access to information.

The Department of Home Affairs gave evidence on Monday it is on track to receive more than 21,000 Freedom of Information requests this financial year, up from 18,412 in 2018-19, but secretary Michael Pezzullo said he wouldn't be directing more resources to the area, or requesting more funding from the minister.

The majority of requests are for personal information, which are also increasing as a proportion of requests.

Department of Environment and Energy officials told another committee it would "bring itself up to standard in the next week" regarding the disclosure log on the department's website, which hasn't been updated since December 2018, despite a legal requirement to upload documents that have been released under Freedom of Information within 10 days.

The department conceded it wasn't compliant with the relevant legislation, but that under an "upsurge" of applications, resources were focused on releasing documents as requested, meaning documents hadn't been uploaded to the log.

In a speech to mark Right to Know day last month, Ms Falk put agencies on notice over handling of disclosure logs, and the amount of practical refusal decisions made without attempts to assist applicants refine their requests.