Information Commissioner's Office

Hadleigh Boxford Group Practice

11 August 2016, Health (Doctors)

The complainant has requested information about the writer of a particular telephone note.  Hadleigh Boxford Group Practice (‘HBGP’) has withheld the information because it says it is the personal data of a third person. The Commissioner’s decision is that HBGP: breached section 17(1) of the FOIA as it failed to issue a valid refusal notice; and that the requested information is the personal data of a third person and is therefore exempt from disclosure under section 40(2) of the FOIA.  HBGP is not required to take any steps. The Commissioner notes that HBGP itself is not a public authority for the purposes of the FOIA. Rather, each GP within the practice is a separate legal person and therefore each is a separate public authority. The Commissioner acknowledges that when an applicant makes a freedom of information request to a medical practice it is reasonable to expect for convenience that the practice will act as the single point of contact. However, each GP has a duty under section 1 of the FOIA to confirm or deny whether information is held and then to provide the requested information to the applicant, subject to the application of any exemptions. For ease and clarity, this notice refers to HBGP where appropriate in detailing the correspondence and analysis that has taken place.

FOI 17: Upheld FOI 40: Not upheld