Dear S Smith

Thank you for your email which I received this morning.

I am sorry you are unhappy with my response to your request for information, specifically use of section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act - it would exceed the appropriate limit to provide information about employees who have made a declaration of interest regarding membership of a lodge or chapter and therefore KCC is not obliged to comply with your request.

You also complain that in my latest response, I did not provide a list of elected members who are members of the Freemasons or any other similar society as it would appear you were expecting me to elaborate on my response to a previous request for information (copy attached). Councillors' declarations of interest (this includes the Leader, Paul Carter) are already in the public domain, and therefore exempt from disclosure under section 21 of the Freedom of Information Act. I understand from your subsequent research that only 2 of the 84 county councillors have actually declared membership of a lodge and what you should be aware of is that the Freedom of Information Act 2000 gives you a right of access to recorded information, and that is what KCC has recorded. Legislation makes no demands on public authorities like KCC, to create information to satisfy requests.

However, the Director of Law and Governance and our Legal Department will now investigate your complaint and will review our responses to your two requests on the subject of Councillors' occupations & Freemasonry on behalf of the Chief Executive. Their reply will be forthcoming within 28 days from receipt (by 13th May 2009)

Best regards

Caroline Dodge

Corporate Access to Information Coordinator, Chief Executive's Department

Kent County Council, Legal & Democratic Services, Room 1.94, Sessions House, County Hall, Maidstone. ME14 1XQ.

Tel: 01622 221652 - Fax: 01622 694383

http://www.kent.gov.uk/council-and-democracy/about-the-council/contact-us/access-to-info.htm

-----Original Message-----
From: S Smith [mailto:xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx.xxx]
Sent: 14 April 2009 21:21
To: Freedom of Information - CED
Subject: Internal review of Freedom of Information request - Free Masons / Councillors Occupations

     Dear Sir or Madam,

     Unfortunately your delayed reply still fails to address the orginal
     request of 20th September 2008 and clarification sort;7th February
     2009;

     Regarding how many Kent County Councillors, who are Elected by the
     Public, are FreeMasons ?

     Clearly,(3rd March 2009) Kent County Council is too ashamed to show
     the Public how many Elected Members reside within; which maybe why
     your last response refers to staff not Councillors. Surely you are
     aware that Councillors/Elected Members are not staff?

     Please answer the questions directly and refrain from smoke and
     mirrors, which could be seen by the Public and rightly so, as a
     form of deception.

     Please also confirm if the Conservative Leader of Kent County
     Council Paul Carter is a member of the FreeMasons or not ?

     Yours sincerely,

     S Smith

From: Freedom of Information - CED
Sent: 14 April 2009 13:38
To: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx.xxx
Subject: FOI/09/210 RESPONSE TO FOI REQUEST RECEIVED 3rd MARCH 2009
Importance: High

Dear S Smith

Thank you for your request for information. Please accept my apologies for the delay in replying to you. I appreciate we have not complied with statutory timescales on this occasion.

In answer to points 2 & 4 of your original email, Kent County Council's Code of Conduct requests that staff "should should declare to an appropriate senior manager, membership of any organisation, lodge, chapter, society, trust or regular gathering or meeting which is not open to members of the public who are not members of that lodge, chapter, society or trust or requires secrecy about its rules, membership or conduct". A failure to disclose personal interests of this kind could result in disciplinary sanctions.

Personnel do not hold central records of KCC all employees' declarations of personal interests. However, the senior managers register of interests (i.e. director level and above) is held centrally, is updated annually and none of the officers included on it has declared that they are members of any lodge. Information about all other officers' membership of the Freemasons would be retained by the individual's line manager. KCC has 240 senior managers and over 2600 employees with supervisory responsibilities for subordinate staff, and to contact each one to ascertain if any of their staff have declared such membership and then extrapolate and collate the findings across the Authority would certainly exceed the appropriate limit of £450 (equivalent to 18 hours at £25 per hour). Therefore under section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, we are not obliged to comply with elements 1 & 3 of your request.

I hope this satisfies your request. If you have a query with the information provided, please contact me on 01622 221652. However, if you are unhappy with this response, and believe KCC has not complied with legislation, please ask for a review by following our complaints process; details can be found at this link http://www.kent.gov.uk/council-and-democracy/about-the-council/contact-us/complaints-procedure.htm#foi on our website. Please quote reference FOI/09/210.

If you still remain dissatisfied following an internal review, you can appeal to the Information Commissioner, who oversees compliance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000. Details of what you need to do, should you wish to pursue this course of action, are available from the Information Commissioner’s website http://www.ico.gov.uk/complaints/freedom_of_information.aspx

Best regards

Caroline Dodge

Corporate Access to Information Coordinator, Chief Executive's Department

Kent County Council, Legal & Democratic Services, Room 1.94, Sessions House, County Hall, Maidstone. ME14 1XQ.

Tel: 01622 221652 - Fax: 01622 694383

http://www.kent.gov.uk/council-and-democracy/about-the-council/contact-us/access-to-info.htm

-----Original Message-----

From: S Smith [mailto:xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx.xxx]

Sent: 07 March 2009 13:02

To: Freedom of Information - CED

Subject: FOI/09/210 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO FOI REQUEST RECEIVED 3rd MARCH 2009

Dear Sir or Madam,

Please quote the clause directly within the code of conduct that applies to this case?

Yours sincerely,

S Smith

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-----Original Message-----
From: S Smith [mailto:xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx.xxx]
Sent: 03 March 2009 14:16
To: Freedom of Information - CED
Subject: Freedom of Information request - Free Masons - Directors/ Officer/Employees

     Dear Sir or Madam,

     Please state whether or not staff (Directors/Officers, etc) who are paid from the public purse, by the Tax Payers are:

     1) Members of the Free Masons?

     2) Required to declare their membership on their declarations of interest form?

     3) Please name all staff who are members of the Free Masons?

     4) Any penalty for non-compliance?

     Yours faithfully,

     S Smith

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