Information Commissioner's Office

Cabinet Office

1 September 2008, Central government

The complainant asked the public authority for information about an incident in which Nyman Levin, the Head of the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment, allegedly ‘dropped dead in the Cabinet Office in 1965’, and specifically for (a) any report about the death, and details of the meeting he was attending, and (b) details of warnings which had been issued to Nyman Levin, and relevant security investigations into him and others. The public authority stated that it did not hold any information relating to the first part of the request; in relation to the second part it refused to confirm or deny whether it held the information, citing section 23(5) and 24(2) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (‘the Act’). The Commissioner decided that the public authority had addressed the first part of the request properly; however, in respect of the second part of the request it had breached section 1(1)(a) by failing to notify the complainant in writing whether it held information of the description specified in the request, and the Commissioner requires it now to provide the complainant with that confirmation or denial. Information Tribunal appeal EA/2008/0080 allowed.

FOI 1: Upheld