Agenda item

To receive and consider report 225/05 of the Monitoring Officer and Solicitor.  

Introduction and Report Summary

As Members will be aware, the above legislation came into force on 1^st January 2005 and gives the public the right to request information from the Council which then has an obligation to respond promptly and within 20 working days by either disclosing the requested information or refusing to disclose on the basis of one of the statutory exceptions.

The 2000 Act gives greater public access to general information held by Public Authorities, like the Council and the 2004 Regulations provide a specific statutory regime for the disclosure of environmental information.  Although “the right to know” is similar in both cases, the provisions are not identical and this is relevant when considering the issue of charging the public for the information sought.

The Council now has the benefit of one year’s experience of dealing with this legislation and 12 months on the time is right to decide whether or not the Council should seek to charge for the information in the future.

The Contact Officer for this report is David Quayle, Monitoring Officer and Solicitor [telephone number: 01235 540312].

Recommendations

To note that there is currently no charging Policy in respect of “right to know requests for information and to consider whether such a Policy should be approved by the Council.

If Members are of the opinion that a Policy should be put into place, then the Executive is invited to consider the draft Policy attached at Appendix A and to recommend its adoption by the Council.

(Time: 3.54pm to 4.08pm)

The Executive received and considered report 225/05 of the Monitoring Officer and Solicitorregarding a draft charging policy for information requests under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and the Environmental Information Regulations 2004.  This legislation came into force on 1^st January 2005, giving the public the right to request information from the Council.  The authority would then have an obligation to respond promptly and within 20 working days by either disclosing the requested information or refusing to disclose based on one of the statutory exceptions. 

The charging provisions were different between the more general 2000 Act and the more specific 2004 Regulations.  Under the Environmental Information Regulations 2004, the Council had the power to charge the applicant for making the information available subject to two exceptions:

(a)        there was no charge to look at public registers or lists containing environmental information held by the Authority and

(b)        there was no charge to examine the information at the Council offices

If the authority invoked a charging system, it would be obliged to publish a schedule of charges and information on the circumstances in which a charge might be made or waived. 

Under the Freedom of Information Act and the related Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limits and Fees) Regulations 2004, the Council had the ability to refuse a request if the estimated cost of compliance exceeded the appropriate statutory limit, which was set at £450.  The Regulations indicated how the estimate should be calculated.  There should be a presumption in favour of refusing a request where the statutory threshold was exceeded but there was discretion for officers to grant an application in exceptional circumstances where the estimate was only marginally over the £450 threshold.  The Council had the power to charge a fee for a Freedom of Information request, but it must not exceed the maximum determined by the Council in accordance with the requirements of the Regulations.  The Council could aggregate the costs it reasonably expected to incur in informing the applicant whether it held the information and the cost of communicating the information to that person.  These costs could include the cost of reproducing any document, postage or similar costs but the Council could not take into account the costs which were attributable to staff time expected to be spent on dealing with the request.  Thus, the scope for recovery of the Council’s full costs was limited.  The draft policy took account of the statutory provisions. 

Noting that other Councils charged for such information requests, Members welcomed the draft policy and considered that charging should be introduced.  The Executive agreed to recommend to the Council the adoption of the policy for implementation as soon as possible and in any event by the beginning of the next financial year. 

The Executive noted that this would be the last Executive meeting attended by the Monitoring Officer and Solicitor, David Quayle.  Members thanked him for his work for the Executive. 

R E C O M M E N D E D       (with Councillor Tessa Ward abstaining)

that the draft Charging Policy for Freedom of Information Act Environmental Information Regulations, as set out in Appendix B to these minutes, be adopted.