Dear Sir or Madam,

Please provide copies of all documentation provided to the CLG
select committee related to a pre-appointment hearing for a new
Local Government Ombudsman (understood to be scheduled for 12
October 2009)

Yours faithfully,

Stuart Hardwicke Carruthers

Dear Stuart Hardwicke Carruthers

Thank you for your request for information dated 6 October 2009, received by us on the same day, which is copied below.

We will endeavour to respond to your request promptly but in any case within 20 working days i.e on or before 3 November 2009.

If you have any queries about your request, please use the request number quoted in the subject line of this email.

Yours sincerely

Vanessa Cubillo
Freedom of Information Assistant

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Dear FOICOMMONS,

The complaint is about the CLG select Committee failing to meet the
publication scheme (s45 of FOIA), rather than handling of request.
The issue of the press release is not urgent and will be difficult
for CLG Select Committee to meet if CLG have failed to provide the
information.

Yours sincerely,

Stuart Hardwicke CARRUTHERS

Dear Mr Hardwicke Carruthers

Thank you for your email.We are unclear if you are asking for new information or for an internal review for F09-334.Could you please clarify what you request is?

Yours sincerely

Vanessa Cubillo
Freedom of Information Assistant

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Dear FOICOMMONS,

The issues are reasonably straightforward. Under the publication
scheme adopted by the Select Committee (CLG) they publish press
notices at least a week before an issue is to be considered. There
appears to have been a failure to follow the publication scheme.
This is understood to be because CLG have not provided the Select
Committee with the information needed to post a press notice.

I wrote to you on 10 June 2009 on this site requesting information
and on 08 July you replied..

'The new local Government Ombudsman and the deputy chair of the
Commission for Local Administration in England are a single, joint
role. Copies of communications between the Department and the
relevant parliamentary committees regarding a pre-appointment
hearing for the appointment of this role are held by the House of
Commons. However, this information is exempt from disclosure under
section 34 (1) of the Freedom of Information Act, as this
information cannot be disclosed without infringing parliamentary
privilege.

... I understand that the Clerk of the Communities and Local
Government Committee has been in touch with you separately and has
confirmed that the Committee is expecting to hold a pre-appointment
hearing with the Government's preferred candidate for Local
Government Ombudsman and Deputy Chair of the Commission for Local
Administration in England. Details of the arrangements for this
hearing will be announced in due course.'

It is recognized that CLG and/or the CLAE despite having identified
a preferred candidate in June might have proplem's in having their
candidate identified as being suitable by the Minister and their
Department..

However.. that should be reported in the press notice that should
have been published according to the agreed publication scheme.

It is not for me to suggest that if CLG as they obviously don't
support the proposed appointee to the CLAE should explain this to
their Select Committee. However, possibly this would be wise.. as
well as the Select Committee seeking to clarify why CLG don't help
their select committee meet their publication scheme.

Effectively, review is requested of the linked 10 June 2009
request.. as there appear to be issues with the publication
scheme.. and I certainly can't fault the handling of the FOI
request by CLG Select Committee who have been very open and
identified that the Minister and their Department has failed to
provide them with the information that they need to publish.

Yours sincerely,

Stuart Hardwicke CARRUTHERS

F09-334 & F09-642

Dear Mr Hardwicke Carruthers,

Thank you for your emails dated 6th and 7th October in which you made a request for information, logged as F09-642, and then clarified that you were not making a request but were seeking an internal review relating to your earlier request F09-334. We understand that you are asking us to consider whether the Communities and Local Government (CLG) Select Committee has complied with the publication scheme.

The CLG Select Committee is covered by the Publication Scheme for the House of Commons. This can be found on our external website via the following link: http://www.parliament.uk/site_informatio.... This Publication Scheme states at section 7.9 that current Committee press notices are listed for approximately a week on our external website on the following link: http://www.parliament.uk/parliamentary_c.... It does not make a commitment to publish announcements of their sessions at least a week before they take place and has not therefore breached the Publication Scheme. Further, the CLG Committee does not have any rule or practice of publishing notices of sessions a week before any session. We are therefore unsure to what you are referring when you state that there is a publication scheme which does make this commitment.

If you would like us to look into this further, please provide us with a link to the publication scheme to which you are referring.

Yours sincerely,

Bob Castle
Head of Information Rights and Information Security

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Dear FOICOMMONS,

The link to the publication scheme adopted by the House of Commons
does not appear to be working..

http://www.parliament.uk/site_informatio...

Also I have been unable to find any reference to its adoption in
Hansard.

Yours sincerely,

Stuart Hardwicke CARRUTHERS

F09-334 & F09-642

Dear Mr Hardwicke Carruthers,

If copying and pasting the link into the address bar does not work, try going to www.parliament.uk and clicking on the Freedom of Information link at the bottom of the page. This will take you to our Freedom of Information web-pages. On the left hand side, select the 'publication schemes' link and then the 'House of Commons publication scheme' link.

The House of Commons publication scheme was considered and approved by the House of Commons Commission. Hansard records proceedings in the chamber of the House and would not therefore contain a record of this.

Yours sincerely,

Bob Castle
Head of Information Rights and Information Security

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Dear FOICOMMONS,

I have followed the links to
http://cms.parliament.uk/documents/uploa...

and the publication is not there.. I am also unable to find any
reference to authorisation of a publication scheme in Hansard..
could you advise ?

This could be one of the reasons why members ended up with such
problems with information publication ???

Yours sincerely,

Stuart Hardwicke CARRUTHERS