This is an HTML version of an attachment to the Freedom of Information request 'Expert witness report'.



  
 
 
14 May 2020 
Mr Duncan Long 
By email only: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx.xxx 
 
Dear Mr Long 
Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA) - Internal Review 
  
Thank you for your email dated 13 March 2020. I have now carried out a review of 
our response to your request for information concerning Dr Sarju Man Shrestha. 
I'm sorry for the delay in responding to you.  
 
To recap, on 9 March 2020 we wrote to explain that we could not confirm whether 
or not we hold the information you request. We provided a link to the doctor’s 
entry on our online register and explained that we may only disclose information 
relating to fitness to practise complaints in certain circumstances. We stated that 
the exemption listed at section 40(5B)(a)(i) of the FOIA applies; Ms Gormley set 
this out as follows: 
 
“Section 40(5B)(a)(i) of the FOIA applies where the information, if held, would be 
the personal data of a third party and where confirming whether it’s held would 
breach any of the principles relating to the processing of  personal data listed at 
Article 5 of the GDPR.  I believe that to publicly confirm or deny whether we hold 
the information would breach the first principle, which requires that the processing 
of personal data is fair, lawful and transparent. I do not believe that any of the 
legal bases for processing listed at Article 6 of the GDPR are met and therefore 
giving you the information would be unlawful.”  
 
My review 
 
I have carefully considered the application of this exemption. My view is that the 
exemption was appropriately applied and therefore our position remains that the 
exemption set out at section 40(5B)(a)(i) of the FOIA applies.   
  
To explain, the FOIA obliges us to firstly confirm whether the requested 
information is held, and secondly to provide it. Both obligations are subject to a 
number of exemptions. Therefore, my first step is to consider if we can confirm 
whether or not the requested information is held.   
  
  


We have a publication and disclosure policy which sets out when and where we will 
publish fitness to practise information. This is available at https://www.gmc-
uk.org/-/media/documents/dc4380-publication-and-disclosure-policy-36609763.pdf.  
 
We can confirm that there is no fitness to practise information publicly available 
about this doctor in line with our policy. In relation to whether or not we hold any 
other fitness to practise information we do not believe that it is appropriate to 
confirm or deny whether any other information is held. We believe that doing so 
would be in breach of the principles relating to the processing of personal data 
listed at Article 5 of the General Data Protection Regulation (as set out in our 
response of 9 March 2020).  
 
Next steps 
  
I'm am sorry that we are unable to assist further regarding your request for 
information under the FOIA. You can appeal this decision to the Information 
Commissioner's Office; further details are available at https://ico.org.uk/make-a-
complaint/. 
 
 
Yours sincerely 
 
 
 
Elizabeth Hiley 
Information Access Manager 
Email: xxxxxxxxx.xxxxx@xxxxxx.xxx