Information Commissioner's Office

Guys and St Thomas NHS Foundation Trust

29 June 2015, Health (NHS)

The complainant has requested information from Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust (‘the Trust’) about its processes for discharging patients and managing its wards.  To date, the Trust has not provided a response or responded to the complainant’s request for an internal review. The Commissioner’s decision is that the Trust has breached section 1(1)(a) (general right of access) and section 10 (time for compliance) of the FOIA because it has not provided the complainant with a response within 20 working days.  The Commissioner requires the public authority to provide the complainant with a response confirming or denying if the information is held. If the information is held the Trust must either disclose the requested information or issue a valid refusal notice in compliance with section 17 of the Act. The public authority must take these steps within 35 calendar days of the date of this decision notice. Failure to comply may result in the Commissioner making written certification of this fact to the High Court pursuant to section 54 of the Act and may be dealt with as a contempt of court.

FOI 1: Upheld FOI 10: Upheld