9th April
Our ref: RFI #662/RFI #719
Your ref:
The Quadrant
Newburn Riverside
Newcastle-upon-Tyne
[FOI #28444 email]
NE15 8NZ
T 0300 060 0846
F 0300 060 2302
Dear Ms Davis
Request for information – RFI #662 and invitation to narrow down request – RFI #719
The Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew may hold copies of the minutes that Natural England was unable to
provide. You can find contact details on the web page linked below.
http://www.kew.org/ask-kew/contact-us/index.htm
Regarding your final paragraph concerning the reports referenced in the minutes provided:
“Looking at the minutes, some of them make reference to other documents, e.g. annual reports on the 'wild
site'. Could you tell me if copies of these, or any other documents in scope of my request, but not released
so far, are held by Natural England? If so, wil you be able to supply copies?”
Since your initial request was for
“all information which you are able to release in relation to the
Cypripedium committee, and Natural England's participation in it (as well as that of your predecessor
bodies), including copies of any minutes of the committee's meetings”, Natural England considers the
reports to be outside of the scope of the original request as these reports do not relate to the committee,
but rather the Cypripedium itself. We will therefore be treating this as a new request made under the
Environmental Information Regulations 2004.
We want to be as open as possible in answering requests, and to help people obtain the information they
are looking for. Unfortunately, in this case the amount of information you have requested is very
substantial. Gathering it together would therefore be likely to involve a significant cost and diversion of
resources from our other work. This could mean that we may have to refuse the request under the
exceptions in the Environmental Information Regulations 2004 covering requests that are manifestly
unreasonable or formulated in too general a manner.
The best way that we can help you is therefore to ask you to consider whether you could narrow down your
request to focus on the precise reports that you would like to receive.
If you have any queries about this letter please contact me.
Yours
Ben Heathcote
Systems, Knowledge, & Information