Bona Vacantia

The request was refused by Treasury Solicitor's Department.

Dear Sir/Madam,

Please treat this as a request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

I would like to know on how many occasions the Treasury Solicitor's Department has received property 'bona vacantia' from a person who died intestate with no relatives.

For each instance, provide the date, the amount of money involved and any other relevant property (real estate, cars, artwork etc.)

Yours faithfully,
Steve Elibank

FOI, Treasury Solicitor's Department

Dear Mr Elibank

REQUEST FOR INFORMATION - RM/140/10

I acknowledge receipt of your email dated 11 March 2010 which was received on 12 March 2010. I will respond to your correspondence shortly.

Yours sincerely

Patrick Driscoll
Data Protection Co-ordinator & Freedom of Information Officer

________________________________________
From: Steve Elibank [[FOI #30610 email]]
Sent: 11 March 2010 21:42
To: FOI
Subject: Freedom of Information request - Bona Vacantia

Dear Sir/Madam,

Please treat this as a request under the Freedom of Information Act
2000.

I would like to know on how many occasions the Treasury Solicitor's
Department has received property 'bona vacantia' from a person who
died intestate with no relatives.

For each instance, provide the date, the amount of money involved
and any other relevant property (real estate, cars, artwork etc.)

Yours faithfully,
Steve Elibank

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TSol is located at One Kemble Street, London, WC2B 4TS. The building is just off Kingsway, near the Royal Courts of Justice. The nearest tube stations are Temple, Holborn and Covent Garden.

The information in this e-mail belongs to HM Government and may be confidential or otherwise protected by law. If you received it in error, we request that you inform us by return e-mail and then delete it immediately, without printing, copying or disseminating it.

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FOI, Treasury Solicitor's Department

Dear Mr Elibank,

Thank you for your email communication of 11^th March 2010 where you
requested information as to how many occasions the Treasury Solicitor’s
Department has received property ‘bona vacantia’ from a person who
died intestate with no relatives. You also asked for each instance, that
we provided the date, the amount of money involved and any other relevant
details of the assets held.

From our preliminary assessment, it is clear that we will not be able to
answer your request without further clarification. Under section 1(3) of
the Freedom of Information Act (“the 2000 Act”), a public authority
need not comply with a request unless any further information reasonably
required to locate the information is supplied. If the request is too
broad or general in nature, the public authorities have a duty to provide
advice and assistance to the applicant in order to focus the request.

In order to provide you with the information on the scale that you have
requested would require one civil servant to spend several weeks looking
through paper files to locate, retrieve and extract the relevant
information.

Section 12 of the 2000 Act makes provision for public authorities to
refuse requests for information where the cost of dealing with them would
exceed the appropriate limit, which for central government is £600. This
represents the estimated cost of one person spending 3.5 working days in
determining whether the department holds the information, locating,
retrieving and extracting the information.

We estimate that it will take us in excess of 3.5 working days to
determine appropriate material and locate, retrieve and extract the
information in reference to your request. Therefore, you request will not
be processed further.

You may wish to refine your request by narrowing its scope by being more
specific about what information you particularly wish to obtain, including
any dates or period of time relevant to the information required. In this
regard I would draw you attention to our website
([1]www.bonavacantia.gov.uk). If you click on “List of Unclaimed Bona
Vacantia Estates” you will be directed to a page of Questions and
Answers that may assist you further and to a link to the List of Unclaimed
Bona Vacantia Estates itself.

If you are unhappy with the level of service you have received in relation
to your request you may ask for an internal review within two months of
the receipt of this response. If you wish to do this you should contact me
at the above address. It will help ensure that your complaint is properly
considered if when requesting an internal review you also set out the
reasons why you are unhappy with the service you have received.

If you are not content with the outcome of an internal review, you have
the right to apply directly to the Information Commissioner for a
decision. The Information Commissioner can be contacted at:

Information Commissioner’s Office

Wycliffe House

Water Lane

Wilmslow

Cheshire

SK9 5AF

If you have any queries about this letter, please contact me. Please
remember to quote the reference number in any future communications.

Patrick Driscoll

Data Protection Co-ordinator and Freedom of Information Officer

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TSol is located at One Kemble Street, London, WC2B 4TS. The building is
just off Kingsway, near the Royal Courts of Justice. The nearest tube
stations are Temple, Holborn and Covent Garden.

The information in this e-mail belongs to HM Government and may be
confidential or otherwise protected by law. If you received it in error,
we request that you inform us by return e-mail and then delete it
immediately, without printing, copying or disseminating it.

The original of this email was scanned for viruses by Government Secure
Intranet (GSi) virus scanning service supplied by Cable & Wireless in
partnership with MessageLabs. HM Government does not however warrant that
it is virus free at point of delivery.

References

Visible links
1. http://www.bonavacantia.gov.uk/

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