Information Commissioner's Office

Cabinet Office

23 May 2016, Central government

The complainant has requested Public Duty Costs Allowance (PDCA) guidance from the Cabinet Office. This request was subject to considerable delay as detailed in this Notice and in a previous decision notice which specifically addressed the timeliness of the Cabinet Office’s initial handling of the request. Eventually, the Cabinet Office relied on exemptions in section 36 of the FOIA (prejudice to the effective conduct of public affairs) as its basis for refusing to provide the requested information. It upheld this position at internal review. However, during the course of the Commissioner’s investigation, it withdrew reliance on these exemptions and disclosed the information to the complainant. The complainant subsequently noticed that the information was freely available online and drew this to the Commissioner’s attention. The Commissioner’s decision is that that the Cabinet Office should have provided the information described in the request to the complainant upon request and contravened the requirements of section 1(1)(b) in failing to do so. No steps are required because the information has now been disclosed.

FOI 1: Upheld