Commissioner commits u-turn on legal professional privilege exemption

Commissioner commits u-turn on legal professional privilege exemption

Not only has the Scottish Information Commissioner changed his mind about the information you are entitled to receive under Scottish Freedom of Information laws (you are now not entitled to receive a copy of actual documents you request, only the information that is contained within them - which opens up an opportunity for public authorities to mislead and misinform the public), but Mr Dunion has also committed a u-turn on legal professional privilege.

In his May/June newsletter (http://www.itspublicknowledge.info/home/News/Newsletter/InformNewsletterMayJune2010.asp), Mr Dunion wrote that he has now changed his approach to the legal professional privilege exemption. Previously in cases where some aspects of legal advice had been disclosed into the public domain, the Commissioner had ruled that the advice in full should be disclosed. In a complete reversal to this, Mr Dunion "no longer considers that this rule will apply to most requests under FOISA" and, so, will not normally order a public authority to disclose legal advice in its entirety where it has already disclosed parts of that advice. This totally contradicts his findings in a 2008 case (002/2008 Ms D Cairns and the City of Edinburgh Council).

Does this now mean that any past cases where Dunion was of the decision that information was to be released on the basis of his erroneous application of the 'cherry picking' rule are all null and void because he applied the law incorrectly?

Let's hope there are more challenges to the Commissioner's rulings in future - remember his decision is not final (and on this evidence it certainly cannot be trusted).

Case: 056/2010 Mr William Lonsdale and the Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council

Commissioner's confusion over personal data results in court failure

Commissioner's confusion over personal data results in court failure

Scotland’s first, longest and most disputed Freedom of Information case has ended up keeping vital cancer statistics secret.

After two investigations by the Scottish Information Commissioner, Kevin Dunion, plus appeals to the Court of Session in Edinburgh and the House of Lords in London, numbers that might (or might not) shed light on links between children’s blood cancer and radioactive pollution have been kept hidden from the public. The case has cost the taxpayer tens of thousands of pounds in legal fees.

According to a report in the Sunday Herald, "The Scottish Green Party, which made the original request, is frustrated and annoyed. The Scottish Health Service, which fought to keep the information confidential, sounds relieved."

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FoI and the monarchy: secrecy rules

FoI and the monarchy: secrecy rules

The exemption from scrutiny under Freedom of Information shows the status gap between crown and public interest - by Heather Brooke.

Where there's secrecy, there's scandal. The two certainly go hand in hand in the picture painted by the weekend's News of the World video that shows Sarah Ferguson accepting a $40,000 briefcase of cash while promising that, for a £500,000 backhander, she would provide an introduction to trade envoy Prince Andrew.

Any effort by the royal family to sweep away any impression of secrecy is, however, undermined by their aversion to transparency. Among the laws rushed through in the "wash-up" of the last government was a change to the Freedom of Information Act granting an absolute ban on all communications with the royal family and royal household. Prior to this such information was still exempt but if there was a public interest in the material, it had to be disclosed.

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Council catches canine terrorists

Council catches canine terrorists

Allerdale Council has admitted to spying on dog owners to see if their pets foul pavements and are wearing a collar, in some cases using hidden cameras.

The authority was today named and shamed by the organisation Big Brother Watch, which says Allerdale has been misusing surveillance legislation aimed at tackling serious crime and terrorism.

The group used the Freedom of Information Act to ask 372 local authorities Regulation of Investigatory Power Act (Ripa) and found it was be used, on average, 11 times a day.

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UFOs and FoI

UFOs and FoI

Defence officials' insulting remarks about the public had to be blanked out of government UFO files before they were made public, a memo has revealed.

The Ministry of Defence had agreed to publish its full archive of reported sightings in response to a deluge of Freedom of Information Act requests.

But the once-secret memo, published on its website, reveals "uncomplimentary comments" were edited out.

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MPs in duck house over unpaid bills

MPs in duck house over unpaid bills

MPs are trying to block the publication of embarrassing details about unpaid food and drinks bills they have run up in the House of Commons.

Next thing you know, they'll be submitting fraudulent expenses claims to pay these bills. Or not.

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Hamfisted Commissioner accuses Scottish Government of taking restricted view of FoI after court ruling

Hamfisted Commissioner accuses Scottish Government of taking restricted view of FoI after court ruling

The Scottish Government has been accused of routinely rejecting valid Freedom of Information requests.

Scottish Information Commissioner Kevin Dunion said civil servants took a "restrictive view" of applications "as a matter of course".

Mr Dunion issued new guidance on how the laws should be interpreted after a ruling said people had the right to the information but not the documents.

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A desperate plea from the Scottish Information Commissioner

A desperate plea from the Scottish Information Commissioner

If you wanted to find out the terms of a legally binding agreement entered into by a public authority and a commercial contractor, would you not simply ask for a copy of the contract?

If you wanted to establish what submissions were made by officials to a government minister in respect of a planning application, would you not simply ask for a copy of their report? In all likelihood you would use the normal everyday language of asking for a copy of the information.

Freedom of information requests couched in terms of copies of contracts, minutes, reports, briefings have produced valuable insights into PFI hospitals and road building programme, schools closures and the incidence of hospital acquired infections. But now the validity of such requests and the need to respond to them is being questioned by Scottish Government officials.

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MoD Staff Embrace Openness (even if MoD doesn't)

MoD Staff Embrace Openness (even if MoD doesn't)

Ministry of Defence staff have leaked secret information onto social-networking sites sixteen times in 18 months.

The MoD refused to say whether the leaks related to sensitive operational issues

The figures were uncovered using the Freedom of Information Act, by computer security firm F-Secure and Lewis PR.

F-Secure security expert Mikko Hypponen said: "It's worrying that employees in sensitive positions have been sharing confidential information.

"They might think they are confiding in friends or family when they go on Facebook. However, the recent changes in Facebook's privacy settings might make them disclose information to the world. This is a potential security risk."

The MoD refused to comment on whether the leaks related to operational issues and what disciplinary action was taken.

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60 children abused every day: NSPCC

60 children abused every day: NSPCC

More than 21,000 child sex offences were recorded in England and Wales last year, figures have revealed.

An average of 60 sex crimes against youngsters were recorded every day, according to data from 43 police forces.

Of the 21,618 cases of abuse - including rape, gross indecency and incest - between April 2008 and March 2009, one in seven victims were younger than 10 and 1,000 were five and under.

The "shocking" statistics were obtained by a Freedom of Information request by the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC).

In more than three out of four cases the offences were committed against 10 to 17-year-olds.

Read more here: Press Association (25 January 2010)

WHO, Swine Flu and Vested Interests - A Bitter Pill to Swallow

WHO, Swine Flu and Vested Interests - A Bitter Pill to Swallow

Was it smart action by governments that kept swine flu (H1N1) in check last year? Or was it more that fears about the disease were grossly (and deliberately) exaggerated to begin with and swine flu never was the killer disease it was made out to be?

As India commences clinical trials of the first H1N1 vaccine, even as many countries are getting rid of their vaccine stockpile, the answer to those questions is no longer academic. Why?

Because documents acquired under the Danish ‘Freedom of Information Act,’ suggest the World Health Organisation (WHO) might have had a vested interest in terming the outbreak of the disease a global pandemic. Not only did a member of the WHO board receive substantial funding for his research centre from vaccine manufacturer, GSK, six other members of the WHO board on vaccines were also found to have financial ties with vaccine companies.

The question is did those links play any part in WHO declaring the disease a pandemic? Yes, says Wolfgang Wodarg, head of health at the Council of Europe. It led governments to activate ‘sleeping contracts’ entered into with vaccine companies during the earlier scare over avian flu for millions of doses of vaccine resulting in huge profits for pharma companies.

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Goodbye Information Tribunal - You Served Us Well

Goodbye Information Tribunal - You Served Us Well

The appeals process for freedom of information and data protection cases changes from today as the previous structure is absorbed into a wider tribunals service. [note: there has never been a tribunal system in Scotland, more's the pity]

The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) is responsible for monitoring organisations' compliance with freedom of information and data protection laws. Appeals against its ruling have until now gone through the Information Tribunal.

From today, though, the Information Tribunal has been subsumed into the General Regulatory Chamber (GRC), part of a unified tribunals service.

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Who decides what constitutes a legitimate FoI request?

Who decides what constitutes a legitimate FoI request?

How many premises across Hampshire are licensed to sell kittens is not a legitimate inquiry, says Ken Thornber.

When is a Freedom of Information (FOI) inquiry a legitimate question and when is an inquiry an outright waste of public money – as well as a trying test of the patience of those of us working in the public sector?

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Police block release of London bomber's will

Police block release of London bomber's will

Scotland Yard is blocking the release of London bomber Mohammad Sidique Khan's will citing human rights and privacy concerns as part of the reason, it has been emerged.

Mention of the 7/7 terrorist's last will and testament was made in a Home Office report on the bombings that left 52 people dead in 2005.

But a Freedom of Information (FoI) request by the Mail on Sunday for the document has been denied, with the Metropolitan Police refusing to allow it to go public.

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Celebrating five years of more open information

Celebrating five years of more open information

The key to a new age of transparent government, or simply a godsend for campaigners, journalists and the terminally curious?

The Freedom of Information (FoI) Act has had an interesting five years, providing the media and campaigners with some tasty scoops, as well offering some uncomfortable moments for politicians and public officers.

Heralding its fifth anniversary this week, Scottish Information Commissioner Kevin Dunion – the man tasked with policing its application – acclaimed the "good news" offered by the legislation, which he said was offering "more information than ever before".

But with recent research showing the public's perception and knowledge of the legislation is on the wane, and anecdotal evidence that public authorities are becoming cannier with their interpretation of the rules, is the transparent Utopia forecast by the proponents of the act in danger of becoming bogged down by bureaucracy?

More worrying for Mr Dunion, is the increased threat of legal challenges to his interpretation of the legislation. In October, he was on the receiving end of an excoriating verdict from Court of Session judges Lords Reed, Clarke and Hardie, who branded his actions "irrational" and said he had failed to treat Glasgow and Dundee Councils fairly on cases involving the sale of land records (Commissioner makes basic errors in law and fails to act fairly).

The judgment said the public was allowed access only to the information contained within documents and not the documents themselves. The ruling, commentators said, paved the way for public authorities to apply even narrower definitions to requests something that appears to fly in the face of the supposed spirit of the law.

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The battle for openness goes on

The battle for openness goes on

Freedom of information: Let the sunshine in

"The worst mistake we ever made," remarked a belligerent member of Tony Blair's cabinet, as he shook his head at the top table in late 2004.

Although the Iraq fiasco was reaching its nadir, he was not referring to any foreign entanglement, but rather to domestic legislation — the Freedom of Information Act, which had passed through parliament several years earlier, and was finally due to come into full force at the start of 2005. The tale provides a neat illustration of how warped political judgments become when they are formed in the dark.

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Bungled police raids last year cost taxpayer £500,000

Bungled police raids last year cost taxpayer £500,000

Police pay out £500,000 for damage in bungled house raids: Poor information leads to the wrong houses being entered, often next door to the actual target

Police in Britain paid out more than half a million pounds last year to repair doors, ceilings and even mantelpiece ornaments smashed in raids that were based on wrong information.

Bungles included a string of heavy-handed operations at properties next door to the real targets, leaving householders terrified and facing months of negotiation for payments.

The Metropolitan police accounted for more than half the national total, with £283,829 paid overall and the highest individual bill, for £6,932. The Police Service of Northern Ireland came second, with £45,072, followed by Lothian and the Borders, with £43,880.

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Ministers' U-turn cost National Express east coast rail line

Ministers' U-turn cost National Express east coast rail line

Ministers considered releasing National Express from its financial obligations, letters show

The government was on the verge of agreeing a deal over National Express's £1.4bn east coast contract that would have kept the troubled transport group in the rail business, it has emerged.

A series of documents rushed out by the Department for Transport under the Freedom of Information Act tonight reveal that the DfT agreed to negotiate switching the expensive franchise to a management contract that would have released National Express from its onerous financial obligations. But ministers changed their position on the deal and National Express was forced to abandon the prestigious main line route in June, plunging the company into a crisis that saw the chief executive resign.

The Guardian (23 December 2009)

An insight into privilege and excess: Queen's finances to be revealed

An insight into privilege and excess: Queen's finances to be revealed

The Independent wins three-year battle to publish secret correspondence with Government over spiralling cost of maintaining royal palaces.

Secret correspondence between the Government and Buckingham Palace concerning the growing public cost of the Royal Family is to be released to The Independent after three years of campaigning.

In a far-reaching ruling, the Government must disclose more than 100 letters and memos written by ministers and members of the Royal Household during negotiations over public subsidies paid to the Queen for the upkeep of her palaces.

The Information Commissioner's decision deals a severe blow to the Royal Family's efforts to ensure correspondence between the Palace and the Government is not caught by the public's right-to-know law. Royal aides warned ministers that they did not want the letters disclosed to The Independent.

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Be scared, be very scared - the Information Commissioner gets fierce

Be scared, be very scared - the Information Commissioner gets fierce

The fearsome Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham

Information Commissioner pledges 'fierce' approach to 'slowcoach' public officials:
Christopher Graham, Britain's new Information Commissioner, has pledged to prosecute public officials who fail to comply with openness laws in his first newspaper interview. 

Mr Graham said he would take a "fierce" approach to overly-secretive authorities. He warned that some public bodies were still "dragging their feet" in complying with the Freedom of Information Act, and said that even Cabinet minutes should not routinely have their release blocked.

In a recent unpublicised case, Mr Graham broke new ground when he threatened a public body, the London Development Agency, with contempt of court proceedings for failing to disclose information under an FOI request. "This will send a shock-wave through the system," he said.

In his first newspaper interview, to mark his first six months in the job, Mr Graham told The Sunday Telegraph: "Shining the spotlight of publicity across a public service is how you find out where money is being wasted." 

At the same time he is urging the Government to introduce firmer enforcement of personal privacy laws including jail sentences of up to two years for rogue company employees who illegally sell confidential information.

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