2 April 2008, Education (University)
On the 1 January 2005 the complainant made a request for information to University College London (“UCL”). The complainant sought three pieces of information held by UCL relating to Dr Andrew Wakefield’s research into the MMR vaccine, as follows:- ‘Patent Applications’; the ‘Management of MMR Controversy’; and details relating to the custody of records. UCL refused to disclose this information under section 21, section 36, section 38, section 40, section 41, section 42 and section 43 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (“the Act”). The Commissioner finds UCL in breach of section 1 (1) (b), 17 (1), 17 (3), 17 (7) 10 (1) of the Act and finds that some of the information ought to have been disclosed to the complainant. As a result of the Commissioner’s intervention some of the information was disclosed to the complainant. The Commissioner requires UCL to disclose some of those categories of the withheld information as identified in this decision notice and as set out in an attached annex served on UCL.
FOI 10: Upheld