Dear Mr Stacey,

RE: Request for an Internal Review

Thank you for your email dated 28 July 2009, asking for an Internal Review regarding information that you had requested relating to HM Prison Service. Your Internal Review has been passed to me for investigation as I carry out Internal Reviews for HM Prison Service related matters.

Your Freedom of Information request originally asked for information relating to prisoners money paid to NACRO.

I apologise for the considerable delay that you experienced in receiving the first response to your initial request for information. This delay can be attributed, in part, by an extensive search to ascertain if this information was available and to the high degree of cross communication within the Ministry of Justice which unfortunately, resulted in the delay in responding to the request.

On 28 July, you were informed that the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) considered that under section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act, the Ministry of Justice is not obliged to comply with your information request as the prescribed costs of supplying you with the information would exceed £600.

The Ministry of Justice had estimated that the cost of answering your entire request would exceed the £600 limit and we were therefore unable to comply with it. It was explained that the information you are seeking is not held centrally and to collate the information would involve contacting each establishment individually to carry out an in depth search of both electronic and paper records. This would incur disproportionate costs.

You have asked why the records are not held centrally, the following information might help:

Prisons were at one time as near to self-accounting units as it was possible to be. They even had local payrolls and were almost self-contained with the Governor having near an absolute autonomy on many issues.

As time moved on and especially so over the last few years, there have been drives for standardisation and uniformity of treatment driven by various initiatives and the ability to provide accurate information to whoever requires it. The system, which the information you requested sits, is one of the last truly local systems and a successor to this system is being installed which will have the capability to produce a central record of prisoner details which include their financial transactions. However, this new system will not be able to collate collective, historical data contained in the old local systems. [Author ID1: at Wed Aug 19 08:41:00 2009 ][Author ID1: at Wed Aug 19 11:20:00 2009 ]

You have also asked who you would need to speak to centrally to find out the information for each prison. I can confirm that there is no one person centrally who can provide the requested information.

You have been advised that if you refine your request so that it falls within the cost limit we will consider it further. It was suggested that you may wish to narrow your request to a particular establishment of interest. However, you should be aware that even if you narrow your request to one establishment, the cost limit exemption may still be engaged.

I am sorry that I am unable to present you with the information that you requested under the Freedom of Information Act but I hope that the Internal Review has clarified why it has not been possible to disclose the information to you on this occasion.

If you are dissatisfied with the result of your Internal Review, you have the right to apply to the Information Commissioner's Office under Section 50 of the FOIA. You can contact the Information Commissioner's Office at the following address:

Information Commissioner's Office

Wycliffe House

Water Lane

Wilmslow

Cheshire

SK9 5AF

Internet: https://www.ico.gov.uk/Global/contact_us.aspx

Yours sincerely,

Roger Davies

Data Access & Compliance Unit