Post Report of the Review of Elective Home Eduction briefings given to anyone by Graham Badman or anyone else from or associated with the DCSF

Dear Mr/Ms Stafford

Thank you for your recent email. A reply will be sent to you as soon as
possible. For information, the departmental standard for correspondence
received is that responses should be sent within 20 working days as you
are requesting information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

Your correspondence has been allocated the reference number
2009/0062825.

Thank you.

Central Allocation Team

Public Communications Team

Tel: 0870 0002288
www.dcsf.gov.uk

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Dear Sir/Madam
Thank you for your request for information, which was received on 13 July.
You requested

Please could you supply me with a list of those individuals and
organisations that recieved a briefing or similar contact following
the publication of the Report of the Review of Elective Home
Education, by Graham Badman, another member of the review team or
anyone else from or associated with the DCSF?

I have dealt with your request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

Following a search of the Department's records, I have established that we
do not hold information precisely in the scope of your request. No
briefing was forwarded to individuals or organisations following the
publication of the report into the review of home education. However, an
email was forwarded to a range of people including stakeholders, and
members of the public on request, following the publication of the
report. The email provided a link to the report, and the government
response on the day of publication, noting that the report had been
published. It did not contain any briefing. The information was also
available to everyone through the Every Child Matters website. The
wording of the email is as follows -

"Graham Badman's report of his independent review of home education has
been published today.

Please follow this link to the report, the government's response

[1]http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/everychildmatters...

and this link to the press notice

[2]http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/pns/DisplayPN.cgi...

The report is also attached here in PDF format. and the press notice "

If you have any queries about this letter, please contact me. Please
remember to quote the reference number above in any future communications.

If you are unhappy with the way your request has been handled, you should
make a complaint to the Department by writing to me within two calendar
months of the date of this letter. Your complaint will be considered by
an independent review panel, who were not involved in the original
consideration of your request.

If you are not content with the outcome of your complaint to the
Department, you may then contact the Information Commissioner's Office.
Yours sincerely,

Josephine Bell
Independent Schools Partnerships and Strategy Team
[email address]
[3]www.dcsf.gov.uk

Your correspondence has been allocated the reference number 2009/0062825.

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Communications via the GSi may be automatically logged, monitored and/or
recorded for legal purposes.

References

Visible links
1. http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/everychildmatters...
http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/everychildmatters...
2. http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/pns/DisplayPN.cgi...
http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/pns/DisplayPN.cgi...
3. http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/

Dear M Stafford

Thank you for your recent email. A reply will be sent to you as soon as
possible. For information, the departmental standard for correspondence
received is that responses should be sent within 20 working days as you
are requesting information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

Your latest correspondence has been allocated the reference number
2009/0070413.

Thank you.

Central Allocation Team

Public Communications Team

Tel: 0870 0002288
www.dcsf.gov.uk

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Dear Stafford,
Thank you for your request for information, which was received on 7
August. You requested -

We know that Graham Badman spoke to Revd Janina Ainsworth of the
Church of England before or after the publication of the review and
left her with the mistaken impression that 40% of home educated
children are on the at risk register, we have access to more than
one email stating this.

We wish to know what other organisations or persons he spoke to
before or after the report was published perhaps leaving them with
a similar impression. These discussions may have been called
post-submission discussions and it is not clear if more than one
organisation or person would have been involved.

I have dealt with your request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

The information you requested is not held by this Department. We do not
have access to the email to which you refer and we are therefore unable to
comment. Nor do we have a record of the conversations to which you refer.

If you have any queries about this letter, please contact me. Please
remember to quote the reference number above in any future communications.

If you are unhappy with the way your request has been handled, you should
make a complaint to the Department by writing to me within two calendar
months of the date of this letter. Your complaint will be considered by
an independent review panel, who were not involved in the original
consideration of your request.

If you are not content with the outcome of your complaint to the
Department, you may then contact the Information Commissioner's Office
Yours sincerely,

Josephine Bell
Independent Schools Partnerships and Strategy Team
[email address]
[1]www.dcsf.gov.uk

Your correspondence has been allocated the reference number 2009/0070413.

show quoted sections

Communications via the GSi may be automatically logged, monitored and/or
recorded for legal purposes.

References

Visible links
1. http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/

Dear M Stafford

Thank you for your recent email. A reply will be sent to you as soon as
possible. For information, the departmental standard for correspondence
received is that responses should be sent within 20 working days as you
are requesting information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

Your correspondence has been allocated the reference number
2009/0081535.

Thank you.

Central Allocation Team

Public Communications Team

Tel: 0870 0002288
www.dcsf.gov.uk

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Dear Ms Stafford

DCSF reference numbers: 2009/0067849; 2009/0074942; 2009/0074943;
2009/0075134; 2009/0077597; 2009/0077887; 2009/0079990; 2009/0080057;
2009/0081535; 2009/0081887; 2009/0090673; and 2009/0090678

Thank you for letting me know that you are content for me to send the
communication to you via Whatdotheyknow.com

My letter is attached.

Yours sincerely

Andrew Partridge
Information Rights Manager, DCSF

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Dear Ms Stafford

DCSF reference numbers: 2009/0067849; 2009/0074942; 2009/0074943;
2009/0075134; 2009/0077597; 2009/0077887; 2009/0079990; 2009/0080057;
2009/0081535; 2009/0081887; 2009/0090673; and 2009/0090678

Thank you for letting me know that you are content for me to send the
communication to you via Whatdotheyknow.com

My letter is attached.

Yours sincerely

Andrew Partridge
Information Rights Manager, DCSF

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Dear Ms Stafford

DCSF reference numbers: 2009/0067849; 2009/0074942; 2009/0074943;
2009/0075134; 2009/0077597; 2009/0077887; 2009/0079990; 2009/0080057;
2009/0081535; 2009/0081887; 2009/0090673; and 2009/0090678

Thank you for letting me know that you are content for me to send the
communication to you via Whatdotheyknow.com

My letter is attached.

Yours sincerely

Andrew Partridge
Information Rights Manager, DCSF

show quoted sections

Dear Ms Stafford

DCSF reference numbers: 2009/0067849; 2009/0074942; 2009/0074943;
2009/0075134; 2009/0077597; 2009/0077887; 2009/0079990; 2009/0080057;
2009/0081535; 2009/0081887; 2009/0090673; and 2009/0090678

Thank you for letting me know that you are content for me to send the
communication to you via Whatdotheyknow.com

My letter is attached.

Yours sincerely

Andrew Partridge
Information Rights Manager, DCSF

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Dear Ms Stafford,
I refer to your request for an internal review which was received on 24
September (case reference 2009/0062825).

Before informing you of the outcome of the internal review I should like
to apologise for the delay in replying. The Department is aware that there
has been a very considerable delay. I much regret this. While I appreciate
that it is in no way a justification I should like to explain that the
Department makes every effort to respond quickly to requests for internal
reviews, but the delay in responding in this case has been due to the
unusual volume of requests the Department has received in recent months.

On 11 July you requested

`a list of those individuals and
organisations that recieved a briefing or similar contact following
the publication of the Report of the Review of Elective Home
Education, by Graham Badman, another member of the review team or
anyone else from or associated with the DCSF?'

The Department has now completed its internal review process and has
carried out a thorough review of the case, chaired by a senior officer who
was not involved with the original request.

The Department has decided to uphold its original response for the reasons
given in its emails of 6 and 28 August 2009.

In addition the review noted:

. That on 6 August you sent a supplementary question - dealt with
under DCSF reference 2009/0070413 - concerning other organisations or
persons Graham Badman may have spoken to before or after the report was
published. The Department replied on 28 August to the effect that it did
not hold this information.

. That in your request for an internal review dated 24 September
you concluded that `as you have now released a couple of scribbled notes
from the press briefing. I think I can conclude that this answer is a
lie.' You asked the Department to check its records very carefully and it
has done so.

. That Graham Badman was independent of the Department, and that it
was therefore to be expected that the Department did not have records of
whom he might have spoken to. Mr Badman was not a public authority under
the Act, but if the Department held any information pertaining to Mr
Badman's discussions, briefings, or other contacts with individuals and
organisations etc, or those of any other member of the review team then
that information would be subject to the Act. It did not hold such
information.

. That no one from the DCSF had provided such briefings to
individuals or organisations. There had been a press briefing on 11 June
by Graham Badman, but no one from the Department was officially fielded by
the Department to take notes. The `scribbled notes' referred to above were
informal manuscript notes taken at the press conference, held by DCSF, and
subsequently released to an FOI requester under the DCSF reference
2009/0067238 on 18 September 2009.

. That a DCSF presence at a press briefing by Graham Badman did not
amount to evidence that the DCSF was lying in its responses of 6 and 28
August. It was hard to see how this inference could be placed on the
facts.

The panel discussed whether the requester might have been intending to
make a request for those present at the press briefing but concluded that
in the light of her request of 6 August this was not the case, nor was it
known whether the Department held such information. The requester was
clearly focussed on individuals or organisations whom Graham Badman or
others were alleged to have spoken to leaving them with a `mistaken
impression' about numbers of home educated children on risk registers; and
neither in her original request of 11 July nor her supplementary request
of 6 August was there any mention of a press briefing. The panel noted
that it was not for public authorities subsequently to reinterpret FOI
requests. It was clear that the information the requester had asked for
was not held by the Department.

The panel concluded that in releasing an email sent by the Department to a
number of people following the publication of the report of the Review,
the Department's response had sought to be helpful. It had answered the
request as best it could.

If you are unhappy with this decision, you have the right to appeal
directly to the Information Commissioner. The Information Commissioner can
be contacted at:

The Case Reception Unit

Customer Service Team

Information Commissioner's Office

Wycliffe House

Water Lane

Wilmslow

Cheshire

SK9 5AF

Further information about the Information Commissioner's complaints
procedure can be found on the Information Commissioner's Office website:
[1]http://www.ico.gov.uk/complaints/freedom...

Yours sincerely,

Penny Jones

Deputy Director

Independent Schools and School Organisation

Your correspondence has been allocated the reference number 2009/0081535.

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Communications via the GSi may be automatically logged, monitored and/or
recorded for legal purposes.

References

Visible links
1. http://www.ico.gov.uk/complaints/freedom...