Information Commissioner's Office

Liverpool City Council

8 June 2016, Local government (City council)

The complainant requested a full copy of a ‘due diligence’ report created by accountants KPMG into the council’s potential acquisition of Liverpool Direct Limited, a company which it jointly owned with British Telecom (BT). The council initially applied the exemption in section 36 of the Act (effective conduct of public affairs), section 43 (commercial interests) and section 41 (information provided in confidence). In the review it decided that neither section 43 nor section 41 were applicable, but maintained its position as regards the application of section 36 to withhold the information. The Commissioner’s decision is that the council was correct to apply section 36 to the information however the public interest in the disclosure of the information outweighs that in the exemption being maintained. The Commissioner has also decided that the council did not comply with section 17 of the Act in its initial response, and its response which did meet the requirements of section 17 did not therefore comply with section 10(1) of the Act. The Commissioner requires the public authority to disclose the information to the complainant.

FOI 10: Upheld FOI 17: Upheld FOI 36: Upheld