Information Commissioner's Office

Barts and The London NHS Trust

25 June 2014, Health (NHS)

The complainant has requested from Barts Health NHS Trust (the “Trust”) information in relation to the tendering and awarding of a contract for the management of Whipps Cross Emergency and Urgent Care Centre to the Partnership of East London Collaboratives (“PELC”), information relating to the recruitment, skills and training of staff particularly in relation to language competency of doctors employed by the Trust, complaints made to the Trust that mention poor communication skills/lack of understanding, inspection reports by the CQC and documentation in relation to complaints reviews that had been undertaken. The Trust provided some of the information requested and confirmed that it did not hold any further information in relation to the request. The complainant was not satisfied with the response received or the length of time taken to respond. Following additional enquiries the Commissioner’s decision is that further information is not held. In relation to the breach of section 10 of the FOIA the Commissioner’s decision is that the Trust has failed to provide a full response to the request within the statutory time frame of 20 working days. However he does not require the Trust to take any further steps to comply with the legislation.

FOI 1: Not upheld FOI 10: Upheld