Further call for HE evidence

On the 19th of January 2010 Bury Council contacted the WhatDoTheyKnow.com team to say "please let me have the contact details to contact S Tyler direct in order to supply the response." WhatDoTheyKnow replied to the council suggesting they ought send their response to the @whatdotheyknow.com email address given in the request.

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Richard - WhatDoTheyKnow.com volunteer

Thank you Richard

I have decided to make my email (of the 19th of January) to Mr Horton of Bury Borough Council public:

"Dear Mr Horton,

WhatDoTheyKnow is an online service which aims to make it easier for people to make freedom of information requests. We publish requests, correspondence and responses online in the interests of openness and transparency.

I presume you are referring to the FOI request made by our user "S Tyler" on the 7th of October 2009, for which an internal review was requested on the 5th of November 2009.

The full correspondence related to this request can be viewed online at:

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/fu...

To respond to a FOI request made via WhatDoTheyKnow.com you can treat it like any other email the council receives - just send your response to the address which the message came from. For this request the associated email address is:

[email address]

Section 11 of the Freedom of Information Act allows those making requests to specify the means of communication they would like used. By making a request via WhatDoTheyKnow a clear preference is being expressed that correspondence, and a response, ought be conducted via WhatDoTheyKnow.com

We will not release our users' direct contact details to public authorities.

I hope that my response is helpful and clarifies the position; do feel free to get in touch again if necessary.

Regards,

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Richard - WhatDoTheyKnow.com volunteer"

As this is one of three cases where Bury Borough Council are refusing to send FOI responses via WhatDoTheyKnow I called Mr Horton to attempt to establish if there was a technical problem, or if a policy decision had been made not to respond via the site. I followed up our phone call with an email confirming what had been said:

"Dear Mr Horton,
CC: Bury Council Legal Services

I am writing to follow-up our phone call a few minutes ago in which you explained:

*You felt the FOI requests made via WhatDoTheyKnow did not include a "name and address which we can check".
*That you were not sure if the requests made via WhatDoTheyKnow complied with the requirements of the act.
*That you were checking with your council's legal department to see if you could respond to FOI requests via @whatdotheyknow.com email addresses.

In response to these comments I stated my belief that the three, substantially overdue, FOI requests for which you hold prepared responses which you have not sent are valid FOI requests which include both a name and address for correspondence.

I said I would send you a link to a letter from the information commissioner to another council confirming the ICO's view that an email address counts as an address for correspondence under the act.

A letter from the ICO to Rother District Council gives guidance on the matter, specifically in the context of requests made via WhatDoTheyKnow. This letter can be obtained via:

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/11...

I hope this makes the position clear and you will be able to supply the FOI responses to the requestors as soon as possible.

Regards,

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Richard - WhatDoTheyKnow.com volunteer
"