Our Ref: FOI 2873

22^nd April 2009

Email response to Mr Gareth Walker

Dear Mr Walker

Request for Information - Freedom of Information Act 2000

I am writing in respect of your recent enquiry for information held by the Authority under the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act 2000. Please find herewith the following:

Request

Can you tell me the total number of applications to your authority made under the Freedom of Information Act and the cost of producing those responses since it's introduction in 2000 broken down into each financial year.

In addition to this, can you tell me the total number of applications and the cost of these requests broken down into each financial year since 2000 that relate to media organisations.

For the remit of this request, media organisations should be considered to be those concerned with televisual output (BBC, ITV etc), print (newspapers) and web based media organisations.

With specific reference I would like the above information for the Express & Star newspaper group which comprises their main newspaper, local editions such as the Chronicle the Shropshire Star and for any requests made by the Taxpayers Alliance organisation or representatives thereof.

Response

Freedom of Information requests are logged on the City Council's corporate database at the time of receipt. Although we record the time spent on each request we do not record the cost of responding to each request.

The Freedom of Information Act came into force 1^st January 2005. There was a budget of £117,000 set aside for dealing with both Freedom of Information requests and Data Protection requests. This figure did not include the officer time spent in each of the Directorates to deal with processing the Freedom of Information requests. As the officers in each of the directorates dealing with Freedom of Information and Data Protection requests do so in addition to their other responsibilities, and as such, their salary costs would need to be apportioned between Freedom of Information/Data Protection work and their other job functions. In addition, the time involved by individual officers in collating and reviewing the information in response to such a request cannot be accurately determined. Accordingly, it is difficult to quantify the exact figure/amount, as it had not been calculated. I have attached a copy of the Cabinet report for you.

I have enclosed the total number of requests received by the City for 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008.

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION FIGURES 2005-2008

Please note the Council does not log all FOI requests on the corporate database. Those which can be dealt with as 'normal business' are done so and do not include in the figures provided above.

In addition to the above table I have attached a table of how many media/press FOI requests we received from 2005 - 2008.

We are unable to provide a further breakdown indicating whether the request has been received from either of the newspapers you have mentioned in your request or Tax Payers Alliance without going into the total number of requests received. Most recently, some of the requests received from Taxpayers Alliance do not indicate that the request is received from that group and also some media requests are not disclosing that they are making requests on behalf of a newspaper.

If you are not satisfied with the response you may ask for an internal review. If subsequently you are not satisfied with the Council's decision you may apply to the Information Commissioner for a decision. Generally, the ICO cannot make a decision unless you have exhausted the complaints procedure provided by the Council. The Information Commissioner can be contacted at the following address:

The Information Commissioner

Wycliffe House

Water Lane

Wilmslow

Cheshire

SK9 5AF

Telephone: 01625 545745

Web Address: www.ico.gov.uk

Yours sincerely

Corporate Information Governance Team

Re Use of Public Sector Information

Where Birmingham City Council is the copyright holder of any information that may be released, re-use for personal, educational or non-commercial purposes is permitted without further reference to the City Council. Where the re-use is for other purposes, such as commercial re-use, the applicant should notify the City Council in writing to seek approval or agree terms for re-use.

Department of Governance Telephone: 0121-303 4876

Corporate Information Governance Team Facsimile: 0121-675 1427

1^st Floor

1 Lancaster Circus

Birmingham B4 7DQ