If you have submitted a Freedom of Information request please accept this
email as acknowledgement that your request has been received. You should
expect a response from us within 20 working days. 
UCL closes for Easter from 5.30pm Thursday 1 April to 9am Monday 12 April.
“You will appreciate that all information requests place some degree of
demand on a public authority’s resources in terms of costs and staff time
and that UCL may need to prioritise resources to other areas, or adapt its
usual approach to information compliance work, in order to meet the
unprecedented challenges we are all facing during the Coronavirus
(COVID-19) pandemic.

Therefore, we need to advise you may experience delays in receiving
responses to information rights requests during the Coronavirus (COVID-19)
pandemic.”

For details on how we use your personal information, please see UCL's
general privacy
notice: [1]www.ucl.ac.uk/legal-services/privacy/general-privacy-notice
Data Protection & FOI
Legal Services
UCL

References

Visible links
1. https://www.ucl.ac.uk/legal-services/pri...

Dear Mr Li

Thank you for your requests of 17 March 2021 and 1 April 2021. The
requests made by you on these dates were for the same data and therefore
we are providing one response to both requests.

We have completed the compilation of information in response to your
requests for 2021/22 Postgraduate programmes admission statistics.

We can confirm that we do hold information of the description specified in
your request and this information is provided attached.

Technically, the list of all postgraduate taught programmes is exempt
information on the basis of the following FOIA exemptions: s.21 -
information accessible to applicant by other means. You can also find the
information you need by following this link:
[1]https://www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-studen.... The
information is also contained in the list of the number of applicants to
each postgraduate taught program 2021/2022 (attached).

As you will see within the attached document, where the number of students
is fewer than 5, some of the information has been withheld because this is
sensitive personal data of third parties or, if linked with other personal
identifiers in the public domain, would likely to become personal data.
This information has been withheld under Section 40(2) of the FOIA by
virtue of Section 40(3)(a)(i).

Section 40(2) of the FOIA allows a public authority to withhold
information under the FOIA where (i) the requested information is personal
data relating to someone other than the requester and (ii) its disclosure
would breach any of the Data Protection principles. In this case, we
believe that the requested information could identify individuals and on
the basis that this information is very sensitive and the individuals
would have a high expectation of confidentiality we do not think that the
disclosure of the personal data would be within the reasonable
expectations of the individuals concerned and it would be unfair to share
it; this therefore breaches the first Data Protection principle.

As the Section 40(2) exemption is an absolute one, there is no need to
conduct a public interest test.

You are free to use any information supplied for your own use, including
for non-commercial research purposes. The information may also be used for
the purposes of news reporting. However, any other type of re-use, for
example by publishing or issuing copies to the public, will require the
permission of the copyright owner.

If you are unhappy with our response to your request and wish to make a
complaint or request a review of our decision, please email
[2][email address]. Emails should include the words ‘Internal
Review’ in the subject and be marked For the Attention of the Chief
Operating Officer, alternatively you should write to:

Chief Operating Officer
University College London
Gower Street
London
WC1E 6BT

If you are not content with the outcome of the internal review, you may
apply directly to the Information Commissioner at the address given below.
You should do this within two months of our final decision. (Please note,
complaints and requests for internal review received more than two months
after the initial decision will not be handled.)

If you have any queries or concerns, please contact me using the details
provided in this email and including the request reference number.

Further information on the Freedom of Information Act is available from
the Information Commissioner’s Office:

Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
SK9 5AF

01625 545700
[3]www.ico.org.uk
[4][email address]

Kind regards

Tara Ffrench

Data Protection and Freedom of Information Adviser 

University College London 

Legal Services 

Data Protection: [5][email address] FOI: [6][UCL request email] 

References

Visible links
1. https://www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-studen...
2. mailto:[email address]
3. http://www.ico.org.uk/
4. mailto:[email address]
5. mailto:[email address]
6. mailto:[UCL request email]