Dear Gavin Chait

Thank you for your Freedom of Information request, which was received by Vale of White Horse District Council on 19 July 2024.

Please accept this email as confirmation that your request has been received and is being considered by the relevant department and that a response will be sent to you within 20 working days, subject to the information not being exempt and subject to any need for clarification.

The deadline for this will be 19 August 2024

The reference number for this request is Vale 24/402

I trust that this email is sufficient to assure you that your request is being dealt with. However, should you have any queries in the meantime, please do not hesitate to contact the Information Governance team at [Vale of White Horse District Council request email].

Kind regards

Information Governance Team

Legal & Democratic Services
Vale of White Horse District Council
www.whitehorsedc.gov.uk

To find out more about how the council holds, uses and stores your personal data, please click on the link below
Vale of White Horse District Council Privacy Notices

show quoted sections

Dear Mr Chait,

 

Thank you for your Freedom of Information requests, which were received by
both South Oxfordshire District Council and Vale of White Horse District
Council, logged under FOI  24/598 South and 24/402 Vale. Please note that
the two councils operate as a shared service hence this joint response.

 

Under Section 1 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (the 2000 Act) you
are entitled to be informed in writing whether the council holds the
information specified in your request and, if that is the case, to have
that information communicated to you unless any of the statutory
exemptions apply. I have considered your request and can confirm we do
hold the information however I believe some of the statutory exemptions
apply to your request as follows.

 

You have asked for:

 

“Freedom of Information request - Complete Non-Residential / Business
Property Rates Data (Q2 2024)

 

In terms of the Freedom of Information Act of 2000, and subject to section
40(2) on personal data, could you please provide me with your local
authority’s complete and most-recently updated list of all business
(non-residential) property rates data, including the following fields:

 

- Billing Authority Property Reference Code (linking the property to the
public VOA database reference)

- Firm's Trading Name (i.e. property occupant or ratepayer)

- Full Property Address (Number, Street, Postal Code, Town)

- Occupation / Vacancy status

- Date of Occupation / Vacancy

- Reliefs and / or exemption categories (classifications) granted or
applied

- Date that reliefs and / or exemption categories granted or applied

- Value of reliefs and / or exemption categories granted or applied (in
Pounds)

- Actual annual rates charged (in Pounds)

 

If you are unable to provide an absolute “Occupation / Vacancy” status,
please provide the balance of the information requested..

 

Please could you also provide a list of definitions for the codes for the
Exemptions and / or Reliefs you use.

 

Please provide these data as machine-readable as either a CSV or Microsoft
Excel file, capable of re-use, and under terms of the Open Government
Licence (reuse for any and all purposes, including commercial).”

 

Our response:

 

We have previously published a large amount of information in relation to
business rates in order to be transparent, accountable and to respond
efficiently to the large number of Freedom of Information requests that we
receive. However, in light of recent Information Tribunal and Information
Commissioner decisions, we have decided this information will no longer be
disclosed either on our website or in response to Freedom of Information
requests.

 

We consider the following categories of business rate data held by the
council to be exempt from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act
2000 (the 2000 Act) and are therefore refusing your request:

 

• Business name
• Correspondence address and contact details
• Liability start date or end dates
• All information relating to exemptions and reliefs
• Rates due and rates actually paid
• Empty property details
• Credit balances
• Amounts written on or written off

 

The reason is that this information engages some or all of the exemptions
under Sections 31, 40(2) and 41 of the 2000 Act. See below for more
details of these exemptions.

 

In arriving at this decision, we have considered the following cases:

 

• The Appeal Decision of the Information Rights First-tier Tribunal -
(Appeal Reference Number: EA/2018/0033) (Westminster)
• The Information Rights First-tier Tribunal – Appeal Reference Number:
EA/2018/0055 (Sheffield)
• The Information Commissioners Office decision reference FS50873141
(Cornwall)

 

Exemptions under the 2000 Act we believe are engaged for withholding
business rate details:

 

• Section 40(2) – Personal data. Information relating to sole
traders/partnerships is exempt from disclosure under Section 40(2).
The Tribunal decisions referred to above confirms that trading names
and addresses are personal data as they relate to a living individual
and the individual is identifiable from those data. This section of
the Act provides an exemption to the general right of access to
information, where the disclosure of personal information would breach
any of the Data Protection principles.

 

• Section 31 – Prevention of crime. We consider that disclosure of empty
property information would increase the risk of fraud and that the
provision of a list of empty properties would make it easier for
criminals to identify targets for property crimes. Disclosure of
credit balances, write offs and write ons also exposes both the
council and businesses to the risk of fraud. As a result, we consider
that disclosure of this information would be likely to prejudice the
prevention of crime. Although we aim to be transparent and accountable
to the public, we consider that the limited wider public interest in
disclosure is outweighed by the very significant public interest in
maintaining the exemption.

 

• Section 41 – Information provided in confidence. This can include the
name, property and billing address, periods of liability, contact
telephone numbers, and whether exemptions and reliefs might have been
applied to those accounts. This information was provided to the
council with an expectation of confidence for the purposes of
calculating rates or reliefs to arrive at an amount payable. We
consider that the withheld information is more than trivial in nature
and is not accessible to the public by other means. This is exemption
is not subject to the public interest test, but section 41(b) has an
assumption that the public interest in maintaining the duty of
confidence will prevail unless the public interest in disclosure
outweighs maintaining that duty. The council recognises the public
interest in openness and transparency however, we consider this does
not outweigh the stronger case against disclosure.

 

Information already available:

 

The following information is already available in the public domain via
the Valuation Office Agency (VOA). Please note the council is prohibited
under section 44(1)(a) of the 2000 Act from disclosing information
received from the VOA.

 

·       Property reference

·       Description of the property (e.g. ‘Hall and Premises' ‘Store and
Premises etc.)

·       Property address (with any personal data removed)

·       Current rateable value

·       Current rateable value effective date

 

For more information on finding business rates valuations, visit the
[1]Valuation Office Agency.

 

Please treat this as the councils’ formal response under the 2000 Act.  If
you are not satisfied with the decision I have made in response to your
request, you can make a request for an internal review by emailing
[2][email address] and [3][Vale of White Horse District Council request email]  within 40 working
days from the date we issued our response. If you remain dissatisfied
after following that procedure, you have the right under Section 50 of the
2000 Act to complain to the Information Commissioner if you feel the
council has not dealt with your request properly. You can contact the
Commissioner at Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF
(telephone number: 0303 123 1113). You can also find further information
at [4]www.ico.org.uk.

 

Kind Regards 

 

 

Vicky Johnson

Revenues & Benefits Client Officer 

 

Finance

Vale of White Horse District Council &

South Oxfordshire District Council

 

Direct Line: 01235 422481 (Abingdon - VWHDC) Text phone users add 18001
before you dial

[mobile number]

Email : [5][email address] 

 

Visit us at:

[6]www.whitehorsedc.gov.uk

[7]www.southoxon.gov.uk 

 

To find out more about how the council holds, uses and stores your
personal data, please click on the appropriate council’s link: 

 

[8]South Oxfordshire District Council  [9]Vale of White Horse District
Council 

 

We’ve moved – our address is now:

Abbey House
Abbey Close
Abingdon
OX14 3JE

 

Please update your records.

 

References

Visible links
1. https://www.gov.uk/find-business-rates
2. mailto:[email address]
3. mailto:[Vale of White Horse District Council request email]
4. http://www.ico.org.uk/
5. mailto:[email address]
6. http://www.whitehorsedc.gov.uk/
7. http://www.southoxon.gov.uk/
8. https://www.southoxon.gov.uk/south-oxfor...
9. https://www.whitehorsedc.gov.uk/vale-of-...