Disclosure Team
Ministry of Justice
102 Petty France
London
SW1H 9AJ
xxxx.xxxxxx@xxxxxxx.xxx.xxx.xx
Deb Williams
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx.xxx
7 August 2019
Dear Ms Williams
Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Request – 190719002
Thank you for your clarification request, received on 19 July 2019 in which you asked for the
following information from the Ministry of Justice (MoJ):
1. Please provide the dates of all creditor bankruptcy petitions that were filed into
the County Court at Maidstone in 2018 on behalf of Maidstone Borough
Council by J E Baring & Co (solicitors).
2. Please also provide the date they were filed, including the filing fee and date it
was paid and the method of payment and the notification date of the pending
action.
3. How many were accepted by the court and if any were rejected the reason for
their rejection.
4. For all those accepted by the court the name of the judge the petitions and
evidence were originally put before (prior to the original bankruptcy petition
allocation hearing date).
5. In addition, please confirm any further dates made by any other judge or
deputy judge extending the original bankruptcy hearing allocated date to a
future date (before the original date was heard), and the name of the judge this
second application was put before to change the original bankruptcy hearing
date.
6. How many petitions on behalf of Maidstone Borough Council have been filed
elsewhere please provide the name of the court) and then transferred to the
County Court at Maidstone.
7. Lastly, please provide what is required from the petitioning creditor before the
County Court Office at Maidstone will accept a petition as valid, and if all codes
of practice are strictly adhered to.
Your request has been handled under the FOIA.
I can confirm that the MoJ holds the information that you have requested and I have
provided it below and attached. However, some of it is exempt from disclosure under section
40(2) of the FOIA, because it contains personal data.
Questions 1, 2 & 3
This information is exempt from disclosure under section 40(2) of the FOIA, because it
contains personal data.
If a request is made for information and the total figure amounts to five people or fewer, the
MoJ must consider whether this could lead to the identification of individuals and whether
disclosure of this information would be in breach of our statutory obligations under the
General Data Protection Regulation and/or the Data Protection Act 2018. We believe that
the release of some of this information would risk identification of the individuals concerned.
For this reason, MoJ has chosen not to provide an exact figure where the true number falls
between one and five. However, it should not be assumed that the actual figure represented
falls at any particular point within this scale; 'five or fewer' is used as a replacement value
from which it would be difficult to isolate or extract any individual data.
Personal data can only be released if to do so would not contravene any of the data
protection principles set out in Article 5(1) of the General Data Protection Regulation and
section 34(1) of the Data Protection Act 2018.
We believe releasing the requested information into the public domain would be unlawful.
Individuals have a clear and strong expectation that their personal data will be held in
confidence and not disclosed to the public under the FOIA.
This is an absolute exemption and does not require a public interest test.
Question 4
I can confirm no creditor petitions are put before a Judge until the hearing date.
Question 5
I can confirm no further dates were made by any other judge or deputy judge extending the
original bankruptcy hearing allocated date to a future date for either case.
Question 6
I can confirm that no petitions on behalf of Maidstone Borough Council have been filed
elsewhere.
Question 7
Please see attached document which provides information about what is required from the
petitioning creditor before the County Court Office at Maidstone will accept a petition as
valid.
It is confirmed that all codes of practice are adhered to.
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Appeal Rights
If you are not satisfied with this response you have the right to request an internal review by
responding in writing to one of the addresses below within two months of the date of this
response.
xxxx.xxxxxx@xxxxxxx.xxx.xx
Disclosure Team, Ministry of Justice, 10.38, 102 Petty France, London, SW1H 9AJ
You do have the right to ask the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) to investigate any
aspect of your complaint. However, please note that the ICO is likely to expect internal
complaints procedures to have been exhausted before beginning their investigation.
Yours sincerely
Knowledge Information Liaison Officer
London & South East Regional Support Unit
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