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'Parking Policy Development Group'.
(Word document)
Date: |
1 October 2009 |
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Your Ref: |
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Our Ref: |
FOIR1316/ARE/JF |
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BY-EMAIL |
Chief Executive Department 1st Floor Town Hall Bolton BL1 1RU
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Barry Moss, Sr. [[FOI #15216 email]]
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Tel: |
01204 331101 |
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Fax: |
01204 331040 |
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www.bolton.gov.uk
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Dear Mr Moss |
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Internal review of request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000
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As the Council's Monitoring Officer, I have now carried out an internal review of the response to your request for information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 ("the Act").
Findings
My findings in this matter are as follows.
In an email received by the Council on 27 July 2009 you made a request under the Act for “copies of the minutes from the meetings of the Parking Policy Development Group back to January 2006 to present day.”
On 27 August the Council responded to your request, declining to provide the information, with reference to the exemption in sections 36 (2) (b) and (c) of the Act on the basis that to provide it would be likely to inhibit the free and frank exchange of views for the purpose of deliberation and the effective conduct of public affairs.
On 28 August you requested an internal review of this decision which was referred to me.
In carrying out this review I have established that the information you have requested is in fact already published on the Council's website and was published there at the time of your request. The minutes of all of the meetings of the Car Parking Policy Development Group from 2006 onwards are included in the papers of the Environmental Services Scrutiny Committee meetings, which are published on our web site and are available at:
The Car Parking Policy Development Group no longer meets, but you can select earlier years from this link and you will find their minutes in the relevant meetings of the Environmental Services Scrutiny Committee as follows:
Minutes of Car Parking PDG |
Published with minutes of Environmental Services Scrutiny Committee |
2/10/2006 |
11/10/2006 |
22/8/2007 |
10/10/2007 |
31/10/2007 (joint meeting with Environmental Services PDG) |
28/11/2007 |
26/11/2007 |
6/2/2008 |
5/2/2008 |
9/4/2008 |
17/10/2008 |
3/12/2008 |
3/3/2009 |
15/4/2009 |
Decision
This being the case I consider that the exemptions in sections 36 of the Act were wrongly applied.
The Council should have applied the exemption in section 21 of the Act, namely that the information would not be supplied directly to you because it was already accessible to you by other means. In so doing they should also have directed you to where you could get the information.
I regret that it has taken some time to establish this, which has meant that you have had to wait longer than necessary to obtain the information you requested. However, I also note that the information has in fact been publicly available throughout this time.
If you disagree with this decision, it is open to you to complain to the Office of the Information Commissioner:
The Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF.
Telephone: 08456 30 60 60 or 01625 54 57 45 Website: www.ico.gov.uk
Yours sincerely
Alan R Eastwood |
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Director of Chief Executive's Department |
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E-mail: |
[email address] |
