TWAFA SLA and grant forms

The request was partially successful.

Christopher Marshall

Dear Sunderland City Council,

Please provide me all information, email records and documentation (including, but not limited to all Bid WPs, Bids, Grant Approval correspondence, Grant Claims, Grant Claim WPs, e-mails & Other WPs) relating to any grants and/or loans applied for by and/or provided to the Tyne and Wear Anti-Fascist Association (TWAFA) between the years of 2014 and 2020. This organisation may also be found under the pseudonym Tyne and Wear Anti-Fascist Coalition (TWAFC).

Please provide this information as an annual breakdown, consisting of the following information:

- The year the record(s) are from;
- The type of information the record is (i.e. email, grant aid form, Bid WP, Bid, Grant Approval correspondence, Grant Claim, Grant Claim WP, Other WP etc);
- The department inside the council responsible for receiving this grant aid form or bid;
- Any specific policies for handling such records at the time it was received;
- The document itself;
- (i) Whether the grant aid bid/request/other was successful (ii) if successful, the reason provided for accepting the application(s), if unsuccessful, the reason provided for rejecting the application(s)

Please note that the Council's data retention schedule for external funding (specifically on grant bids and claims) requires that the requested information be retained for 6 years or longer if specified in the individual agreements, therefore the requested information is within the data retention period and should still exist.

In addition, can the Council please also provide:

- Any specific policies towards approving grants/loans/bids/other from TWAFA/TWAFC;
- Any specific Service Level Agreements (SLAs) which were in force or drafted before, during or after this period;
- The individuals responsible inside the Council for signing off these grant aid requests/bids/loans/other and the department which the individuals were employed within;
- (i) What due diligence was carried out on TWAFA prior to releasing any grant aid/loan/other money and (ii) whether this due diligence was an ongoing process throughout the duration of the grant aid/bid/loan etc

Any information contrary to regulations or other procedures may be stripped or redacted from the relevant documents.

Please provide this information in electronic format to this address.

Yours faithfully,

Christopher Marshall

Solicitor - Freedom of Information, Sunderland City Council

2 Attachments

Re: Your request for information concerning:

 

TWAFA SLA and Grant Forms

 

The Council aims to provide available information promptly and in any
event within 20 working days, unless, exceptionally, there is a need to
consider whether the information is exempt from disclosure.

 

I will contact you again soon in connection with your request.

 

Please quote the reference below if you contact the Council regarding this
request.

 

Customer Request Number: FOI_2969

 

[1]cid:image001.jpg@01D3FCC2.ACA7A800[2]cid:image002.jpg@01D3FCC2.ACA7A800

 

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OCEFOI, Sunderland City Council

2 Attachments

Dear Christopher Marshall,

 

With regard to your FOI (FOI 2969), unfortunately in view of the demands
on staff time in prioritising the Council’s response to the coronavirus
pandemic, we anticipate there will be a delay in providing a response to
your request. As you will appreciate in these extraordinary circumstances
I am unable to provide an estimated time for reply at this juncture but
can assure you that you will receive a response to your enquiry.

 

I thank you for your patience in the meantime.

 

Kind Regards

Angela

 

 

Angela Miller

Compliance Officer

City Development Directorate

Sunderland City Council

Tel: (0191) 561 7567

Email: [1][email address]

 

     [2]oce20902 Supporting Equality Logo Colour

 

[3]www.sunderland.gov.uk

 

 

 

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OCEFOI, Sunderland City Council

2 Attachments

Dear Christopher Marshall,

 

I refer to your recent request for information under the Freedom of
Information Act 2000. I can confirm that the Council does hold this
information, as detailed below.

 

Please provide me all information, email records and documentation
(including, but not limited to all Bid WPs, Bids, Grant Approval
correspondence, Grant Claims, Grant Claim WPs, e-mails & Other WPs)
relating to any grants and/or loans applied for by and/or provided to the
Tyne and Wear Anti-Fascist Association (TWAFA) between the years of 2014
and 2020. This organisation may also be found under the pseudonym Tyne and
Wear Anti-Fascist Coalition (TWAFC).

 

Please provide this information as an annual breakdown, consisting of the
following information:

 

- The year the record(s) are from;

- The type of information the record is (i.e. email, grant aid form, Bid
WP, Bid, Grant Approval correspondence, Grant Claim, Grant Claim WP, Other
WP etc);

- The department inside the council responsible for receiving this grant
aid form or bid;

- Any specific policies for handling such records at the time it was
received;

- The document itself;

- (i) Whether the grant aid bid/request/other was successful (ii) if
successful, the reason provided for accepting the application(s), if
unsuccessful, the reason provided for rejecting the application(s)

 

Please note that the Council's data retention schedule for external
funding (specifically on grant bids and claims) requires that the
requested information be retained for 6 years or longer if specified in
the individual agreements, therefore the requested information is within
the data retention period and should still exist.

The council had a Service Level Agreement with TWAFA which ended in March
2017. Documentation is not held after two years in line with the retention
schedule. 

Financial records remain available where they are within retention, but
other documentation has been deleted as it reached the end of its
retention period.

The financial breakdown of funding from 2014 is as follows:

 

2013/2014 = £7,500

2014/2015 = £3,750

2015/2016 = £3,750

2016/2017 = £7,500

2017/2018 = NIL

2018/2019 = NIL

2019/2020 = NIL

 

In addition, can the Council please also provide:

 

- Any specific policies towards approving grants/loans/bids/other from
TWAFA/TWAFC;

The initial SLA was drawn up in 2004, due diligence would have been
carried out at this time.  The staff who worked within the unit and
commissioned the initial work have since left the employ of the council.

 

- Any specific Service Level Agreements (SLAs) which were in force or
drafted before, during or after this period;

The council had a Service Level Agreement with TWAFA which ended in March
2017. Documentation is not held after two years in line with the retention
schedule.

 

- The individuals responsible inside the Council for signing off these
grant aid requests/bids/loans/other and the department which the
individuals were employed within;

Between 2013 to March 2017 the funding was through the Office of the Chief
Executive.

 

- (i) What due diligence was carried out on TWAFA prior to releasing any
grant aid/loan/other money and (ii) whether this due diligence was an
ongoing process throughout the duration of the grant aid/bid/loan etc

When the initial SLA was drawn up in 2004, due diligence would have been
carried out at that time however records in relation to this were disposed
of in line with the document retention and disposal schedule at that
time. 

 

This information has been provided in response to a Freedom of Information
request and this must be acknowledged in any subsequent use of the
information. In addition, the authority must be notified of any proposed
re-use of this information for commercial or other purposes.

 

I hope this is satisfactory. If, however, you are dissatisfied with our
response to your request for information, you can ask for the decision to
be reviewed in reply to this letter, however any request for review must
be submitted within 40 days of the date of this freedom of information
response. The review will be removed from the Directorate and coordinated
by the Council’s team of Solicitors. A request for review should be
directed, by email to [1][Sunderland City Council request email] by post or
by hand addressed to Business Support, Sunderland City Council, Civic
Centre, Burdon Road, Sunderland. SR2 7DN.

 

If this fails to resolve your concerns, then you have the right to apply
to the Information Commissioner for a decision.

 

Kind Regards

Angela

 

 

Angela Miller

Compliance Officer

City Development Directorate

Sunderland City Council

Tel: (0191) 561 7567

Email: [2][email address]

 

     [3]oce20902 Supporting Equality Logo Colour

 

[4]www.sunderland.gov.uk

 

 

 

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Christopher Marshall

Dear Angela Miller,

Thank you for your reply however several things you have responded with are cause for serious concern.

Firstly, if the Council is aware of the fact that a Service Level Agreement with TWAFA ended in 2017, then why do you not have documentation evidencing the Service Level Agreement, and why can you not provide the relevant document showing that the said Service Level Agreement was in place, as requested? The Service Level Agreement appears to have been part of the Grant Aid bid by TWAFA, so why has any of this information not been provided. If you know it ended in 2017, you must have documentation proving this was the case still.

According to the "Financial Management" data retention document on the Council's own website, last updated in 2017 but still live as of 30/11/2020, the following data should be retained for 6 years AFTER the relevant completion/expiry date:

----
Grant Claims and supporting working
papers.
Financial information may include
staffing details/costs.

This includes:

Bid WPs
Bids
Grant Approval correspondance
Grant Claims
Grant Claim WPs
e-mails
Other WPs
----

Why therefore have you been unable to provide any grant claims, emails or grant approval correspondence (in particular but not limited to) as requested, considering the last grant was awarded in 2016/17, and therefore within the relevant data retention schedule as described above?

In addition to this, you say that the initial SLA was drawn up in 2004. This again suggests that documentation still exists which points to this fact, or the knowledge of this date would otherwise be impossible. If documentation still exists from 2004 then why can't the Council locate documentation from 2016/17?

You also state that the staff within the relevant unit and who commissioned the work have since left the Council. If no records exist then how is the Council aware of which staff members were involved with the relevant grant aid claims and bids, and how are you aware that they have left the Council?

You reiterate once again that the SLA ended in 2017. The fact you had a Service Level Agreement, suggests that this was a paid service or level of "contract" from TWAFA that the Council paid for. According to the Council's data retention schedule, the process involved in the design and specification of a contract should be retained for 6 years after the expiration of the contract, and in regard to contracts under seal, this should be retained for 12 years. Procurement information, for example, should be reviewed only after 7 years past the expiration date.

Can you therefore please confirm what the exact arrangement was with TWAFA, as this appears extremely vague and ambiguous as of this moment, and why any of this potentially additional documentation does not appear to exist.

You state that between 2013-2017 the funding was through the Chief Executive's Office. If you are aware of this fact, then who was responsible for funding TWAFA before this, and how can you know this when you claim the documentation has been destroyed?

Finally, you state that the initial SLA was drawn up in 2004. This suggests that the SLA was continued throughout all of the time period TWAFA were receiving public funds. If you are aware that it began in 2004, and it ended in 2017, then why has relevant due diligence and other documentation been destroyed before the SLA ended?

In relation to due diligence, you appear to suggest that this was carried out only at the start of the project in 2004, and you fail to mention anything about the years I have enquired about. Can you therefore confirm that due diligence was carried out on TWAFA either periodically, or on an annual basis prior to approving the grant, throughout the period of time TWAFA were receiving public funds, and not just as a one off in 2004? If due diligence was carried out, can you please confirm what this was as requested.

I look forward to your response at the earliest.

Yours sincerely,

Christopher Marshall

Solicitor - Freedom of Information, Sunderland City Council

Re: Your request for information concerning:

TWAFA SLA and grant forms

The Council aims to provide available information promptly and in any event within 20 working days, unless, exceptionally, there is a need to consider whether the information is exempt from disclosure.

I will contact you again soon in connection with your request.

Please quote the reference below if you contact the Council regarding this request.

Customer Request Number: FOI_3105

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Christopher Marshall

Dear Solicitor - Freedom of Information,

Your response seems to suggest you are considering this as a new FOI request. Please note that I was replying to my existing FOI request FOI_2969 - this case is not to be treated as a new FOI request but to clarify the poor response to my original.

I am therefore requesting an internal review as to how the Council can have spectacularly failed in providing a clear response which answers me questions and then again in responding to the questions I have posed about it.

Yours sincerely,

Christopher Marshall

Solicitor - Freedom of Information, Sunderland City Council

2 Attachments

 

Dear Mr Marshall

 

I acknowledge your email requesting a review of your FOI request.

 

I can confirm that this will now be allocated to an officer, independent
of the original decision, to undertake a review of the information
supplied.

 

The review normally takes 15 working days, however should there be a delay
you will be kept informed.

 

Kind Regards

 

 

 

 

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Peter Bracken, Sunderland City Council

1 Attachment

Dear Mr Marshall

 

Please find attached the Council’s response to your request for a review
of your FOI request.

 

Yours sincerely

 

Peter Bracken

Solicitor

Corporate Services Directorate

Sunderland City Council

PO Box 100, Civic Centre

Sunderland

SR2 7DN

 

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