FOI Request handling, Data for Jan 2009 - Jan 2010 inclusive

The request was partially successful.

Dear Lambeth Borough Council,

(1) Please provide the number of FOI Requests received each month by the council for calendar year 2009 and January 2010, and the overall total.

(2) Please confirm whether it is council policy to acknowledge all FOI Requests, and how quickly.

If it is, provide the % which met that target in each month and overall.

If not, explain how the council considers this complies with ICO guidance and the council's duties under the Act, in particular §16 to be helpful.

(3) For each month and the whole period, include how many received the council's response
(a) within 15wd,
(b) in 16-20 wd,
(c) after 20wd,
and (d) any still awaiting response.

(4) Include also how many were met
(a) in full,
(b) partly,
(c) rejected, with a note of the numbers for each reason for rejection - not held, too costly, fees notices etc.

(5) Include how many were referred to Internal Review, how long these took as per (3) above, and the outcome

(6) Lastly for each month and total, include the number of requests that had ICO involvement, distinguishing between numbers where the ICO asked the council to respond due to delay by the council, or where the ICO made a ruling after the council process was exhausted.

Itemise each of these presumably very few cases individually with full dates and outcome.

Please provide this electronically, preferably in an XLS spreadsheet.

Yours faithfully,

James Muldoon

Goodwin,Ian, Lambeth Borough Council

Our reference: 125792

Dear Mr Muldoon,

Thank you for your Freedom of Information request below. We will endeavour to respond to your request as soon as possible and in any extent within 20 working days (i.e. by 15 March).

Yours sincerely,

Ian Goodwin
Information Governance Manager
London Borough of Lambeth
ICT Services
Finance & Resources

tel: 02079262341

www.lambeth.gov.uk

3rd floor Ivor House, 1 Acre Lane, London, SW2 5BF.
Lambeth - Making a difference

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Gardner1,Richard, Lambeth Borough Council

4 Attachments

Dear Mr Muldoon

Further to your recent Freedom of Information Request, I attach various
reports from our requests tracking system. For completeness I have
included separately a small number of requests that were answered under
the Environmental Information Regulations 2004 that would otherwise be
excluded from our response. These include date received, date
acknowledged, date response due (20 working days), and date actually
responded, response outcome (disclosure in full or in part, information
not held and/or exemptions cited) and number of working days taken to
respond for each request. For requests which are currently pending the
outcome fields will be blank. From this information you can derive
percentage statistics in your preferred format.

It is Lambeth policy to acknowledge requests within 2 working days
following receipt. This is generally achieved for requests arriving by
email into the central mailbox [1][Lambeth Borough Council request email] but requests arriving
by other routes such as emails to named contacts or traditional hard copy
letters may be delayed due to internal redirection particularly if
information requests are buried in correspondence primarily about other
matters.

Right to Review

If you are dissatisfied with the way in which your Freedom of Information
request has been dealt with you can request an internal review by
emailing: [email address] (Please quote the reference number
above) or by writing to:

Corporate Complaints Manager

Lambeth Town Hall

Brixton Hill

Brixton

SW2 1RW

If you remain dissatisfied with the outcome of the review you have a
further right to appeal to the Information Commissioner, who regulates the
implementation of the Freedom of Information Act. The Commissioner can be
contacted at the following address:

Information Commissioner's Office

Wycliffe House

Water Lane

Wilmslow

Cheshire

SK9 5AF

Enquiry line: 01625 545745

Thank you for your interest in Lambeth Council.

Richard Gardner

Information Compliance Adviser

London Borough of Lambeth

ICT Services

Finance & Resources

 

tel: 020 79267741

www.lambeth.gov.uk

3rd Floor, Ivor House, 1 Acre Lane, London, SW2 5BF

 

Lambeth - Making a difference

 

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Dear Gardner1,Richard,

Thank you for your prompt reply, which does contain the bare data.
For some reason, the entries appear to be in a random order, rather than by date of receipt which seems the obvious ordering.

Unfortunately, to generate the statistics required it needs to be in an XLS spreadsheet.
This is particularly important in view of the random nature of the data.
Could you kindly provide the data in that format?

I notice that in several cases, for example cases 116042, 120109, 110794, 123346, there is a Done Date entered, but no Outcome.
This would appear to indicate some lapse within the department which should be corrected.

Does the council publish any monthly or annual reports on FOI Compliance?
Is so, could you provide the most recent relevant ones?

Yours sincerely,

James Muldoon

Gardner1,Richard, Lambeth Borough Council

1 Attachment

Dear Mr Muldoon

Please find attached merged reports FOI/EIR Jan 2009 to Jan 2010
inclusive in Excel format sorted by receipt date.

I have examined the email correspondence associated with the various
case-refs that you quote to determine the outcome in each case which was
as follows:-

116042 = Granted in Full
120109 = Granted in Full
110794 = Information not held (no formally adopted policy in place for
Muslim Burials)
123346 = Granted in Part (other information not held)

I have updated the outcome coding on the database for these cases which
is normally the responsibility of the relevant business unit providing
the answer (wherever in the Council). Other records will be tidied up in
due course when looked at - this is an administrative task which does
not affect the substantive outcome of the cases.

I hope that this meets now your requirtements.

Richard Gardner
Information Compliance Adviser
London Borough of Lambeth
ICT Services
Finance & Resources

tel: 020 79267741
www.lambeth.gov.uk
3rd Floor, Ivor House, 1 Acre Lane, London, SW2 5BF

Lambeth - Making a difference

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