Date: 12/10/2009

Dear Mr Walker

Re: Freedom of Information request number 1435

Thank you for your request dated 09/10/2009 for the following information:

By letter of 30 September 2009, The Secretary of State Ed Balls

appointed Maurice Smith to enquire into the "promotion of racism in

schools". Part of the review is aimed at determining whether

members of the British National Party (BNP) should be allowed to

work as teachers or in the wider school workforce.

Please provide the following information under the Freedom of

Information Act 2000.

1. Has your authority ever found a member of the BNP or any other

political Party guilty of a disciplinary offence related to their

Party membership in the last three years? If so please give

information as to when and how many.

2. Has any parent complained to you regarding the Party membership

of any employee or the expression of political views within School

classrooms under your authority during the last three years?

3. What safeguards do you currently have in place to prevent

members of any political Party promoting their views within

Schools

Section 10(1) of the Freedom of Information Act requires that we process your application within 20 working days of the date we received your request, therefore we will respond to you by 06/11/2009. If we are unable to meet this deadline we will inform you of this and the reasons why.

If the information is already available to you through the Council's publication scheme we will advise you of this. We will advise you whether we hold the information you have requested and if you are able to access it. In some cases where exclusions apply we will not be able to provide you with the information you have requested. If we are unable to provide the information you request we will contact you and inform you of the reasons why. In some cases there may be a charge for the information you have requested. We will keep charges to a minimum and will inform you as soon as possible of any charges that apply.

If you are unhappy with the Council's response you can make a complaint via the Council's complaints procedures and this will be looked into. If you are not happy with this decision you may then appeal to the Information Commissioner.

Yours faithfully

LHenley

Lee Henley

Freedom of Information Coordinator

Telephone (01375) 652500

Macro FOI.acknowledgement.letter

Macro FOI.acknowledgement.letter