Communication with Scottish Government on redeployment of FOI unit staff

The request was partially successful.

Dear Scottish Information Commissioner,

In November 2017 the Scottish Information Commissioner announced that he would be undertaking an intervention into the Scottish Government's FOI performance. The intervention aims to support improvement in the Scottish Government's performance in relation to FOI.

In a response to a freedom of information request, a member of the FOI unit stated:

“……approximately half of the staff of the [FOI] Unit has been redeployed to Covid critical roles: some have been redeployed on a full time basis, with others combining Covid-related shifts and aspects of their ordinary roles. Those remaining in the Unit have been refocussed on providing core services such as triaging and allocating new requests, and on providing essential support to staff across the organisation. Regrettably, this has led to delays in responding to your request”

https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/i...

The effect of the redeployment of FOI unit staff may undermine the freedom of information in a period running up to the elections for the Scottish Parliament.

INFORMATION REQUESTED: Please provide all correspondence between the Scottish Government and the Scottish Information Commissioner on the decision to redeploy Scottish Government FOI Unit staff to Covid critical roles thus impacting the Scottish Government’s performance in relation to FOI.

Yours faithfully,

Bill Stevenson

Enquiries, Scottish Information Commissioner

2 Attachments

Dear Mr Stevenson

 

Please find attached a letter of acknowledgment of your information
request received on 12 February 2021.

 

If you have any difficulty opening the attached please let me know and we
can provide in an alternate format.

 

Yours sincerely

 

Kim Berry

Finance and Administration Manager

________________________________________

 

Scottish Information Commissioner

Kinburn Castle, Doubledykes Road

St Andrews, KY16 9DS

 

Email:   [1][Scottish Information Commissioner request email]

Web:    [2]www.itspublicknowledge.info

Twitter:  [3]@FOIScotland

 

[4]cid:image001.jpg@01D1B813.F6E95030

 

For information about what we do with personal data see our [5]Privacy
Notice

References

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http://www.itspublicknowledge.info/
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Paul Mutch, Scottish Information Commissioner

Dear Mr Stevenson,

Thank your for your information request of 12 February 2021. As noted in our acknowledgement of 12 February, I have been asked by the Commissioner to respond to your request for:

"All correspondence between the Scottish Government and the Scottish Information Commissioner on the decision to redeploy Scottish Government FOI Unit staff to Covid critical roles thus impacting the Scottish Government’s performance in relation to FOI."

I am currently in the process of identifying information we hold which may fall within the scope of your request, and will respond as soon as possible, and by no later than Friday 12 March 2021.

In the meantime, however, I'd like to take this opportunity to bring the following information to your attention, which may be of interest given the nature of your request:

Scottish Information Commissioner's Scottish Government Intervention Second Progress Report

Since 2017 the Commissioner has been carrying out an intervention to support the Scottish Government to improve its FOI practice and performance. As part of this activity, the Commissioner has undertaken a detailed assessment of the Scottish Government's FOI practice, and published an Intervention Report setting out his findings. This work led to the development and implementation of an improvement Action Plan by the Scottish Government, and the Commissioner has gone on to publish annual progress reports which consider the Scottish Government's progress against the issues highlighted.

The most recent of these progress reports, published in September 2020, considers issues which are relevant to your request. In particular, the Commissioner's September report noted the impact of the Scottish Government's pandemic-related diversion of resources on its FOI performance, and urged the Scottish Government to direct attention towards the restoration of its FOI function, including the restoration of resource within the Scottish Government's FOI Unit.

You can read the Commissioner's second progress report, and find out more about our ongoing intervention, on our website at www.itspublicknowledge.info/SGIntervention.

It is worth noting that there has been an improvement in the Scottish Government's FOI performance against timescales since the period covered by the second progress report. The Scottish Government publishes its own data on FOI performance against timescales at: https://www.gov.scot/publications/freedo.... You'll see from this data that 84% of requests in September 2020 were responded to within the 20 working day timescale. This figure continues to fall short of the 95% target required by the Commissioner's intervention, but nevertheless represents an improvement on the 58% figure reported in May (and discussed in the Commissioner's second progress report).

The Commissioner is continuing to actively monitor Scottish Government FOI practice and performance as part of his ongoing intervention, with the aim of supporting a continued and sustained improvement in FOI performance.

Impact of Covid-19 on FOI in Scotland Special Report

The Commissioner also laid a Special Report before the Scottish Parliament in December 2020 which considered the impact that the Covid-19 pandemic has had on FOI in Scotland. This report urges authorities across the public sector to restore trained FOI staff to key roles wherever this resource has been reduced. You can read this report on our website at: www.itspublicknowledge.info/home/SICRepo...

As mentioned, I will respond to your information request as soon as I am in a position to do so. In the meantime, however, I hope the above information is of use.

Regards,

Paul Mutch

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Dear Paul Mutch,

Thank you very much for the information you have provided it extremely helpful in understanding the situation.

I am perhaps a bit more sceptical about the recent relative improvement in performance and would like to see FOI performance statistics in the run up to and through the elections for the Scottish Parliament in May. As I am sure you are aware, the statistical method used to monitor performance still allows for reverse triaging if non-sensitive FOI responses are processed quicker than those from (say) journalists. Triaging and reverse triaging become more important when there are limited resources and this is not being monitored.

I look forward to receiving your full response in due course.

Yours sincerely,

Bill Stevenson

Paul Mutch, Scottish Information Commissioner

Thank you for your email. I'm currently working from home, and will
respond to your email as soon as possible.

 

If you need to contact someone urgently, please email
[Scottish Information Commissioner request email].

 

Like many other Scottish public authorities, the office of the Scottish
Information Commissioner has been impacted by the coronavirus Covid-19
pandemic, and our office premises are temporarily closed in line with
government guidance. However, most of our services are still available.

 

For more information visit: [1]www.itspublicknowledge.info/home/contact or
email [2][Scottish Information Commissioner request email].

 

For information about what we do with personal data see our [3]Privacy
Notice

References

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2. mailto:[Scottish Information Commissioner request email]
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Dear Paul Mutch,

Your initial response was very helpful but I must say that your link to the Scottish Government webpage on FOI performance says a lot - 5 months of missing data! All down to Covid I assume.

Yours sincerely,

Bill Stevenson

Bill Stevenson left an annotation ()

https://www.gov.scot/publications/freedo...

As of 11 March 2021, data on performance is up to September 2020.

Paul Mutch, Scottish Information Commissioner

6 Attachments

Dear Mr Stevenson,

Thank you for your information request of 12 February, in which you sought:

"All correspondence between the Scottish Government and the Scottish Information Commissioner on the decision to redeploy Scottish Government FOI Unit staff to Covid critical roles thus impacting the Scottish Government’s performance in relation to FOI."

Please find attached my response to your request. You'll see from the attached that my response contains the following documents:

My response to your information request
Appendix 1 - A schedule of the documents I have disclosed in response to your request
Appendix 2 - Copies of the documents I have disclosed in response to your request
Appendix 3 - An additional document disclosed in response to your request
Appendix 4 - My consideration of the personal information exemption in relation to personal data which has been removed
Appendix 5 - Additional information, not covered by the scope of your request, but which has been provided under our duty to advise and assist you.

I hope the attached information is useful.

Regards,

Paul Mutch

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Dear Paul Mutch,

REF: 202100184

Thank you very much for all the information you have provided, it is extremely helpful in understanding how government FOI performance is being monitored. I would, however, like to request an internal review based on two issues:

(1) Some information redacted does not constitute personal data.

Some information contained in email addresses does not constitute personal data. For example, the suffix "gov scot" in the email address of civil servants is not personal data and therefore should be disclosed. In communications between different organisation it is important to see, in order to aid understanding, which organisation is initiating or receiving the communication. This is impeded if email addresses are simply redacted in full. This problem can be seen in your Document 1, for example.

(2) Civil servants names and job titles should not be redacted.

It appears that the SIC have adopted an untested convention set by the Scottish Government of not disclosing the names and job titles of "junior" civil servants. This does not appear to be a sufficiently solid ground for redacting the information. Furthermore, when the SIC engages with the Scottish Government on the subject of the Intervention Report, the interaction must be at a senior level (it would not appear credible that the SIC engages with junior civil servants on such an important topic). Therefore, I believe the names and job titles of civil servants should be disclosed.

Yours sincerely,

Bill Stevenson

Scottish Information Commissioner

1 Attachment

Our Ref: 202100184

Dear Mr Stevenson,

Please find attached our letter of acknowledgement regarding your recent
request for review.

If you experience any difficulties opening or viewing the file please do
not hesitate in contacting me.

With best wishes,

Bethan Owen
Administrator

Scottish Information Commissioner
Kinburn Castle
Doubledykes Road
St Andrews
KY16 9DS
[1]www.itspublicknowledge.info

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Notice

References

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2. http://www.itspublicknowledge.info/home/...

Enquiries, Scottish Information Commissioner

2 Attachments

Dear Mr Stevenson

 

Please find attached a letter of response to your request for review of 12
March 2021.

 

If you have any difficulty opening the attached file please let me know
and I can provide in an alternate format.

 

Yours sincerely

 

Kim Berry

PA to Daren Fitzhenry, Scottish Information Commissioner

____________________________________________________

 

Scottish Information Commissioner

Kinburn Castle, Doubledykes Road

St Andrews, KY16 9DS

 

Email:   [1][Scottish Information Commissioner request email]

Web:    [2]www.itspublicknowledge.info

Twitter:  [3]@FOIScotland

 

[4]cid:image001.jpg@01D1B813.F6E95030

 

For information about what we do with personal data see our [5]Privacy
Notice

References

Visible links
1. mailto:[Scottish Information Commissioner request email]
2. http://www.itspublicknowledge.info/
http://www.itspublicknowledge.info/
3. https://twitter.com/FOIScotland
5. http://www.itspublicknowledge.info/home/...