Dear Mr Cannell

Review of Freedom of Information Request FR1825a

Further to your email of 10 May 2010 requesting a review in this matter I confirm that I have now looked through the paperwork provided to me by the Freedom of Information Team and made my determination.

You requested that the application of s.12(1) be reviewed as you considered the estimate of work was unduly complicated.

You made 2 requests which requested information regarding statistics relating to court orders/service where addresses of respondents were not known.

Notwithstanding your views of the time estimates, as the time estimate was calculated by a senior childcare solicitor with knowledge of the Council's file management and detailed knowledge of court practices

As detailed this calculation was done by a senior childcare lawyer, Chantelle Whitehead, and as such we would follow that. Chantelle did not keep a record of which files she used, she merely asked colleagues to provide files so that that was no bias in picking which files to use as a test ie there was a true representation of the files available.

Chantelle disagrees with the applicant's views on where the information is contained. If you require evidence of this, we can obtain copies or have Chantelle show you the sort of information she would need to look through if you wish.

Conclusion

The Council completed a reasonable estimate of the time it would take to complete the request. The Council would normally rely upon the estimate of the manager dealing with the relevant information. Apart from the slight delay in responding to the second request, it is considered that all parts of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 have been dealt with properly.

However as regards your specific request, this related to who was involved with the discussions and this information was not provided to you. Accordingly there has been a breach of s.1 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000. In addition, as the time limit for compliance has now passed there was also a breach of s.10 of the Act.

A Code of Practice has been issued under Section 45 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, which public authority should follow in dealing with requests for information. Paragraph 45 of the Code of Practice states that where the outcome of a complaint is that procedures within an authority have not been properly followed by the authority staff, the authority should apologise to the applicants. The authority should also take appropriate steps to prevent similar errors occurring in future.

Please accept my apologies on behalf of Northamptonshire County Council and the Freedom of Information Team for the failure to supply the information to you.

Although in this matter there was a breach of the Act, I understand that this occurred due to the high volume and seemingly similar requests received relating to this subject matter in a short space of time. In addition, many of these requests were based on the misunderstandings and confusion which had arisen over the status of the decision being referred to. Accordingly a standard statement was prepared by CYPS to try to explain the position and aid understanding. This statement was used for all the similar requests and with hindsight was not sufficient enough in detail in some cases and specifically should not have been applied to your request.

As a consequence of this matter an action for the Freedom of Information team as an urgent priority will be to ensure involvement of the team at the preliminary planning stages of consultations of this size and impact to ensure the co-ordinated and correct responses are distributed and misunderstandings of this nature do not arise.

Finally, I am also aware that there has been a substantial delay between your request for a review and the review taking place and would also extend my apologies for this. Although your request was itself a simple one, the complex nature of the decisions being taken and the need for in depth understanding of the background processes and why this situation arose resulted in some delay whilst I looked at every aspect of the matter. As you will also appreciate, the Easter period also caused further delay due to leave.

Yours sincerely

Paul Edwards

Head of Business Intelligence and Performance

Northamptonshire County Council

Northamptonshire County Council

Please ask for: Paul Edwards

Tel: 01604 237053

Our ref: FR1825a review

Your ref:

Date: 9 June 2010

Room 91 County Hall

St Georges Row

Northampton

NN1 1DN

w. www.northamptonshire.gov.uk

t. 01604 237053

f. 01604 236644

e. paedwards:@northamptonshire.gov.uk