Tribunal was confined to considering only that evidence that was in existence at that earlier time.
67 As in those cases, it is necessary in the present case to ask whether the defined phrase "official document of a Minister", as it appears in operative provisions, has the temporal element for which Mr Patrick contends. The text of the definition contained in s 4(1) (extracted at [21] above) is critical to that task, but it must be borne in mind that the words there are definitional. They have no operation other than in the specific contexts of the FOI Act in which the defined phrase is employed. They must be construed having regard to that specific context, as well as the wider context of the FOI Act and the general law. As Kiefel CJ, Nettle and Gordon JJ said in SZTAL v Minister for Immigration and Border Protection (2017) 262 CLR 362 (at [14]):
The starting point for the ascertaining of the meaning of a statutory provision is the text of the statute whist, at the same time, regard is had to its context and purpose. Context should be regarded at this first stage and not at some later stage and it should be regarded in its widest sense. This is not to deny the importance of the natural and ordinary meaning of a word, namely how it is ordinarily understood in discourse, to the process of construction. Considerations of context and purpose simply recognise that, understood in its statutory, historical or other context, some other meaning of a word may be suggested, and so too, if its ordinary meaning is not consistent with the statutory purpose, that meaning must be rejected.
(footnotes omitted)
68 In Taylor v Owners – Strata Plan 11564 (2014) 253 CLR 531 Gageler and Keane JJ emphasised that the task of construction involves the attribution of legal meaning to statutory text, read in context. Their Honours continued:
65 … 'Ordinarily, that meaning (the legal meaning) will correspond with the grammatical meaning … But not always'. Context sometimes favours an ungrammatical legal meaning. Ungrammatical legal meaning sometimes involves reading statutory text as containing implicit words. Implicit words are sometimes words of limitation. They are sometimes words of extension. But they are always words of explanation. The constructional task remains throughout to expound the meaning of the statutory text, not to divine unexpressed legislative intention or to remedy perceived legislative inattention. Construction is not speculation, and it is not repair.
66 Context more often reveals statutory text to be capable of a range of potential meanings, some of which may be less immediately obvious or more awkward than others, but none of which is wholly ungrammatical or unnatural. The choice between alternative meanings then turns less on linguistic fit than on evaluation of the relative coherence of the alternatives with identified statutory objects or policies.
(footnotes omitted)
