British
and Irish Legal Information Institute
Freely Available British and Irish Public Legal Information
[Home] [Databases] [World Law] [Multidatabase Search] [Help] [Feedback]
Information Commissioner's Office
You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> Information Commissioner's Office >> Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council (Local government) [2023] UKICO 185837 (30 March 2023)
URL: http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKICO/2023/185837.html
Cite as: [2023] UKICO 185837
[New search] [Printable PDF version] [Help]
Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council
The complainant requested information from Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council (“the Council”) about an investigation in to the Chief Executive (“the Chief Executive”) of a charity (“the Charity”) to which the Council provided funding. The Council provided some information within the scope of the request, stated that some of the information requested was not held, refused parts of the request under section 12 of FOIA (cost of compliance) and section 14(2) of FOIA (repeat request) and withheld some information under section 40 of FOIA (personal information) and section 36 of FOIA (prejudice to the effective conduct of public affairs). The Commissioner’s decision is as follows: on the balance of probabilities, the Council does not hold any information within scope of parts 3,4 and 6 of the request; the Council has failed to demonstrate that section 12 is engaged as a basis for refusing to respond to parts 5,7,8 and 9 of the request; the Council was not entitled to rely on section 14(2) to refuse part 1 of the request; the Council was entitled to withhold some, but not all of the information it withheld under section 40; the Council was not entitled to rely on section 36(2)(c) to withhold the information withheld on that basis. The Commissioner requires the public authority to take the following steps to ensure compliance with the legislation: carry out searches of its network files using relevant search terms that relate to the specific topic of this request and provide the complainant with a fresh response to parts 5,7,8 and 9 of the request; issue a fresh response to part 1 of the request, which does not rely on section 14(2); disclose the information which the Commissioner has decided is not exempt under section 40 as listed in paragraph 62 of this notice; disclose the information within scope of the request within the email withheld under section 36(2)(c), making appropriate redactions of personal data in compliance with FOIA.FOI 14(2): Complaint upheld FOI 40(2): Complaint partly upheld FOI 36(2)(c): Complaint upheld FOI 1: Complaint not upheld FOI 12: Complaint upheld
Decision notice: 185837