number of times Disclosure Team have requested a reference number for internal reviews
Dear HM Courts and Tribunals Service,
1) How many times in the last 2 years has the HMCTS Disclosure Team written to an FOI Requestor who has requested an internal review of an FOI Response asking them for a 'reference number' (see example below) for their own Disclosure Team's 'initial' FOI Response.
2) How many requests for an internal review have been received by HMCTS in the last 2 years? If the number is so great as to exceed the £600 cost limit, reduce the scope to one year. Still too many? Reduce accordingly.
How many of those reviews have upheld the original HMCT response?
Background to question 1:
I know from my own experience this has happened on at least 3 occasions. How many times has it happened to others? Here is the message I received on the 11 November:
from Disclosure Team HMCTS sent on 11 November 2022
Dear Mr Jones,
Can you please provide the reference number for our initial response for which you are requesting an Internal Review
Regards
Disclosure Team.
And another example from the 4 January 2023
Dear Mr Jones
Can you please provide the reference number which would have been provided in our initial response for which you are requesting an Internal Review.
Regards
Disclosure Team
What's puzzling is that I think it's inconceivable that the HMCTS Disclosure Team is so incompetent as to be unable to access the reference number from their own response on the form on the WDTK site! They only have to scroll upwards.
And I'm sure they are neither so devious, nor so lacking in integrity as to calculate it could well produce some delay and allow them more time to agree on a "strategy" for conducting what is invariably a searching and objective review.
Does the Disclosure Team have any explanation?
Yours faithfully,
Dudley Jones
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copies and inform the sender by return e-mail. Internet e-mail is not a
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someone else. Please bear that in mind when deciding whether to send
material in response to this message by e-mail. This e-mail (whether you
are the sender or the recipient) may be monitored, recorded and retained
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ensure laws are not broken when composing or forwarding e-mails and their
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