Dear Sir or Madam,

I am writing to request information under the Freedom of
Information Act 2000.

Please could you provide me with a list of materials contained
within "eXtra", the electoral administrator's password-protected
area of the Electoral Commission website.

Many thanks in advance for your consideration of my request.

Kind regards,

Benny Spooner

Dear Mr Spooner

Our Ref: FOI 58/08

Thank you for your request under the Freedom of Information Act dated 26
May 2008 (received by the Commission on 27 May 2008), concerning
materials contained within 'eXtra.'

The Commission aims to respond to requests for information promptly and
within the statutory timeframe of twenty working days.

You may expect to receive a reply sent from the Commission by 24 June
2008.

Yours sincerely

Izabella Evans
Legal Officer
Tel: 020 7271 0523
Fax: 020 7271 00505
[email address]
www.electoralcommission.org.uk
www.aboutmyvote.co.uk

Democracy matters

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Dear Sir,

Our Ref: FOI 58 08

Thank you for your request under the Freedom of Information Act dated 26
May 2008 (received by the Commission on 27 May 2008). Please find below
your request together with our response.

Your request

A complete list of materials contained within "eXtra", the electoral
administrator's password-protected area of the Electoral Commission
website.

Our response

Material disclosed under the Freedom of Information Act

We are pleased to provide below a list of information contained within
the "eXtra" protected area of our website. This list does not include
information which we consider to be exempt from disclosure under the
Freedom of information Act.

* Form K
* Baseline performance survey information
* Application form for anonymous registration
* Canvass form for England, Scotland and Wales
* Annual canvass resources available in numerous languages
* Guidance for Returning Offices
* Guidance to Candidates & Agents
* Polling station handbooks
* Count materials
* Guidance for interpreting electoral change orders
* A report on the post election seminars held in 2005
* Code of conduct for political parties, candidates and canvassers
on the handling of postal vote applications and postal ballot papers
* Example letter from an ERO to public confirming postal vote
arrangements
* Step by step guide to voting by post
* Links to the summary and the judgement of the Birmingham
election petitions
* Guidance for police produced jointly with ACPO and ACPOS
* Guidance for observers
* Details of public awareness campaigns
* Updates on the Electoral Administration Act
* Reports on the pilots schemes held in 2006
* Rolling registration forms
* Postal vote application forms
* Proxy forms
* Application to vote for overseas electors
* Application to vote for members of armed forces
* Application to vote for Crown Servants
* Registration manual
* Managing 21st century elections: A UK training strategy
* Electoral administration alerts
* Electoral administration circulars
* Government departments circulars (not updated since March 06)
* Rolling registration dates for 2008
* FAQ's (12 questions in total)
* An archive of data relating to: NE referendum, past pilot
schemes, European Parliamentary Elections (EPE), EPE training programme
2004, EPE training needs analysis, training audit 2002.

Please note that most of the information in the above list is accessible
via our main website at: http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/el...
<http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/el...> .

For your convenience, please find links to two documents that are not
directly available from our website.

http://www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk/cms/2...

http://www.acpos.police.uk/Documents/Pol...
toral%20Commission%20Guidance%20on%20Prevention%20of%20Electoral%20Fraud
%202007.pdf

Exempt information

Some of the information within the "extra" protected area of the website
is not in the public domain and only accessible to electoral
administrators. The Commission is not providing a complete list of the
information held on the "extra" protected area of our website as it
contains material that is exempt under section 31 (a) for the prevention
or detection of crime and/ or (c) the administration of justice. The
non-disclosable information that the Commission holds is exempt under
one or both of these exemptions.

Section 31 (a) of the Freedom of information Act exempts information
which has been held at any time by a public authority for the prevention
or detection of crime, or section 31 (c) for the administration of
justice.

The Commission is empowered under Section 10(1) and (3) of PPERA to
provide advice and assistance as respects any matter in which the
Commission may have skill and experience. The information you have
requested is held by the Commission for these functions.

The above exemptions operate on the basis that disclosure of information
in these categories would be harmful. The exemptions are therefore
subject to the public interest test. The information you have requested
will be exempt from disclosure if the public interest in maintaining the
exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information.
The Commission understands the importance for the public to be informed
about the democratic process. However, as the release of the information
you have requested could jeopardise the Commission's ability to
effectively discharge its functions, we consider that it is in the
public interest to uphold these exemptions. More specifically, we
consider that the public interest is best served by promoting the
prevention and detection of crime and the administration of justice by
the Commission and other authorities it works with.
I realise that you may be disappointed by this part of our response. The
Commission strives to be an open, transparent authority, but in some
circumstances we cannot responsibly release requested information, and
we ask for your understanding in this regard.
If you are not satisfied with this response, please note that the
Commission operates a review procedure, details of which are attached.

<<Our Freedom of Information and Environmental Information review
procedure.doc>>

Please also note that if you have exhausted all internal Commission
review procedures and you are still not satisfied you have the right to
appeal to the Information Commissioner. Details of this procedure can be
found on the ICO website: http://www.ico.gov.uk
<BLOCKED::/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.ico.gov.uk>

Yours sincerely

Izabella Evans
Legal Officer
The Electoral Commission
Trevelyan House
Great Peter Street
London SW1P 2HW
Tel: 020 7271 0523
Fax: 020 7271 0505
www.electoralcommission.org.uk
www.aboutmyvote.co.uk

Democracy matters

Dear Sir or Madam,

Re: Request for internal review of Freedom of Information Act
Request 58 08

Thank you for your reply to my request for a list of materials
contained within "eXtra", the electoral administrator's
password-protected area of the Electoral Commission website. I am
now writing to ask you to conduct an internal review of your
response to my request.

I would ask you to revew two aspects of your decision not to
release some of of the information requested:

1) That the information requested is exempt under section 31 (a)
and / or section 31 (c) of the FOI Act 2000.

2) That it is not in the public interest to release this
information.

In respect of the whether the information is exempt, I would
reiterate that I am requesting a list of materials held, not the
materials themselves. I would therefore ask you to reconsider
whether it is correct to state that the list of materials (rather
than the materials themselves) is used for the prevention or
detection of crime or the administration of justice.

In respect of the second point, you argue that

"the information you have requested could jeopardise the
Commission's ability to effectively discharge its functions, we
consider that it is in the public interest to uphold these
exemptions. More specifically, we consider that the public interest
is best served by promoting the prevention and detection of crime
and the administration of justice by the Commission and other
authorities it works with."

I do not agree that the release of the list of materials (as
opposed to the materials themselves) could jeopardise the
commission's ability to effectively discharge its functions to a
significant degree. This argument against releasing the information
is clearly outweighed by the importance of the public being
satisfied that returning officers are being supplied with
appropriate materials, and that commission resources are being
appropriately allocated.

I look forward to your response.

Yours faithfully,

Benny Spooner

Dear Mr. Spooner,

Our Ref: RFOI 58 08

Thank you for your request for review under the Freedom of Information Act of FOI 58 08 dated July 27 2008.

Please find below your original request.

Please could you provide me with a list of materials contained within "eXtra", the electoral administrator's password-protected
area of the Electoral Commission website.

The Commission aims to respond to requests for review promptly and will make every effort to send a detailed response within 20 working days.

Where this is not possible, you will receive a letter explaining why, and given a date by which you will receive a detailed reply. In any event, we will not exceed 40 working days in responding to your request.

.
Yours sincerely

Izabella Evans
Legal Officer
Tel: 020 7271 0523
Fax: 020 7271 0505
[email address]

Democracy matters

P Please consider the environment before printing this email.

Dear Izabella Evans,

Your Ref: RFOI 58 08

Please could you advise me of the reasons why I am still awaiting a
response to my request for an internal review?

Kind regards,

Benny Spooner

Dear Mr Spooner

I refer to your email of 27 July 2008 in which you asked the Electoral Commission to review its response to your earlier request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (the 'Act'). I apologise for the delay in finalising the review that you asked us to conduct.

In your original email sent to us on 26 May 2008 you asked for the complete list of materials contained within 'eXtranet' (a part of the Electoral Commission's website). In our response of 30 June 2008, we provided you with a partial list of materials and advised that certain material contained within 'eXtranet' had been excluded from that list. We believed that confirmation of the existence of the material would give rise to prejudice of the kind referred to in section 31(3) of the Act - and that in turn, the public interest favoured use of the section 31 exemption.

I have reviewed our decision not to include the material on the list we provided to you. In my judgment, the public interest in the Commission's activities being as transparent as possible outweighs the public interest factors weighing against the listing of the material. The material not included in the list we previously provided to you is;

Advice Note to Electoral Registration Officers: advice to assess returned registration forms
* Advice Notes 1-7 (2006)
* Advice Notes 8-10 (2007)

This material, along with the material listed in our response of 30 June, constitutes a complete list of the materials contained within 'eXtranet' at the time of your original request.

I am sorry that the materials named above were not listed in our letter to you of 30 June. The Electoral Commission will endeavour to learn from the review we have conducted in your case.

Thank you for contacting the Electoral Commission.

Yours sincerely

Elizabeth Morrow
Senior Lawyer

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