Uned Rhyddid Gwybodaeth a’r Cynllun Cyhoeddi/ Freedom of Information and Publication
Scheme Unit
Response Date:
30/10/2013
2013/622 Review – Ched Evans
In response to your recent request for a review;
I am writing to request an internal review of North Wales Police's handling of my
FOI request 'Press Department - Ched Evans'.
Your response is both spurious and further more incorrect in law.
Are we to believe that the entire number of emails between North Wales Police &
members of the press mentioning the name Ched Evans is around 10?
I wish the internal review to look into this & whether the emails below are in fact
genuine. They strike me, as being too well constructed to be informal exchanges. Your original request asked for ‘Copies of all emails between North Wales' Press Department
and members of media both local and national….
all emails that make reference to Ched
Evans’.
Our Press department originally searched their emails and archives for correspondence
between themselves and members of the media relating to Ched Evans. This process has
been conducted again as part of the review process and one additional email has come to
light. However concerns have been raised in releasing the attachment to the email as this
could lead to the identification of individuals and disclose information covered by
prohibitions - therefore the following exemptions have been engaged.
Section 40 (2) Personal Information.
Section 44 (1) (a) Information Covered By Prohibitions on Disclosure.
The interests of third parties could be jeopardised by the release of information that could
lead to their identification.
There are also legal restrictions in place to protect the identity of individuals i.e. Sexual
Offences (Amendment) Act 1992 provides anonymity that was once only given to victims of
rape, to victims of most other sexual offences. Schedule 2 (as amended by Schedule 6 of
the Sexual Offences Act 2003, provides a list of offences, the victims of which are
guaranteed anonymity under the provision of Section 1.
Section 40 is a class based exemption, therefore it is not necessary to evidence harm caused by
disclosure.
Sections 44 is an absolute and class based exemption which means that the legislators have
identified that harm would be caused by release and there is no requirement to consider the
public interest test.
Section 40 (2) –Personal Information (absolute exemption)
The information you have requested constitutes personal data of which you are not the subject and
the information falls within paragraphs (a) to (d) of the definition of ‘data’ in Section 1(1) of the
Data protection Act 1998 and disclosure of the information to a member of the public otherwise
than under this act would contravene data protection principles.
Section 40 is a class based exemption, therefore it is not necessary to evidence harm caused by
disclosure.
The data protection rights of a third party would be breached by disclosure, therefore section 40(2)
is an absolute exemption and a Public Interest Test is not necessary. This is so because personal
data is governed by another law (The Data Protection Act 1998) and there are two elements to this
exemption.
All requests made under FOIA are applicant blind. A request must be treated as such and a public
authority will always view any disclosure as into the public domain. Thus North Wales Police must
be satisfied that any release of information will be potentially available to the general public. It is
therefore on this basis that the following is relevant.
The first element of this exemption is engaged if the information requested constitutes personal
data and is made by the data subject. The information will be covered by section 40(1) and the
request will be dealt with under section 7 of the Data Protection Act, rights of access.
The second element of this exemption is engaged if the personal data is about someone other than
the applicant. Where someone makes an application for information other than the data subject,
disclosure of that information will often constitute a breach of the Data Protection Act covered by
section 40(2).
Personal data is regulated under the principles of the Data Protection Act and when information
contains personal data about a third party it can only be refused if disclosure would breach any of
the data protection principles.
As previously highlighted, any disclosure under the FOIA is a public disclosure and release of the
identity of an individual would breach principles 1 & 2 of the Data protection Act 1998.
These principles require personal data to be: 1) processed (defined to include ‘obtain’) fairly and
lawfully and 2) obtained only for specified and lawful purposes and not processed incompatibly with
the specified purposes.
‘Data subjects’ are provided with certain legal enforceable rights under the Data Protection Act
1988. The fact that the information is held for lawful policing purposes, disclosing it onwards would
breach the principles, and would be incompatible with the data subject’s right that their data is
held securely. By disclosing this information, the force could be subject to enforcement proceedings
under the act if it breaches any of those principles.
Therefore, in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000, this letter acts as a
Refusal Notice under section 17 (1) of the legislation.
All other emails retrieved have been sent to you in your original response with the exception
of any personal information. I have re-assessed the information in the emails and some
additional names are being released to you. The section 40 originally applied to the other
names still stands. Please see the attached information.
To address your reasons for review; you have been provided with all information held by
North Wales Police at the time of your original request and that are relevant to the question
posed. Therefore only emails between North Wales' Press Department and members of
media both local and national that make reference to Ched Evans have been disclosed.
I can confirm that all emails are genuine. The emails are correspondence with external
media and the press department are representing North Wales Police.
THIS INFORMATION HAS BEEN PROVIDED IN RESPONSE TO A REQUEST UNDER THE
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000, AND IS CORRECT AS AT 18/10/2013
Document Outline