FOI Request handling, Data for Jan 2009 - Jan 2010 inclusive
Dear Tower Hamlets Borough Council,
(1) Please provide the number of FOI Requests received each month by the council for calendar year 2009 and January 2010, and the overall total.
(2) Please confirm whether it is council policy to acknowledge all FOI Requests, and how quickly.
If it is, provide the % which met that target in each month and overall.
If not, explain how the council considers this complies with ICO guidance and the council's duties under the Act, in particular §16 to be helpful.
(3) For each month and the whole period, include how many received the council's response
(a) within 15wd,
(b) in 16-20 wd,
(c) after 20wd,
and (d) any still awaiting response.
(4) Include also how many were met
(a) in full,
(b) partly,
(c) rejected, with a note of the numbers for each reason for rejection - not held, too costly, fees notices etc.
(5) Include how many were referred to Internal Review, how long these took as per (3) above, and the outcome
(6) Lastly for each month and total, include the number of requests that had ICO involvement, distinguishing between numbers where the ICO asked the council to respond due to delay by the council, or where the ICO made a ruling after the council process was exhausted.
Itemise each of these presumably very few cases individually with full dates and outcome.
Please provide this electronically, preferably in an XLS spreadsheet.
Yours faithfully,
James Muldoon
Dear Sir/Madam
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000
Thank you for your email.
Your request is being considered and if the information is held you will receive the information requested within the statutory timescale of 20 working days as defined by the Freedom of Information Act 2000, subject to the information not being exempt.
If the time taken to meet your request is likely to exceed 18 hours, we will contact you and ask you amend your request to bring it below this time limit. We will assist you with suggestions of how this might be achieved.
I may also contact you if the request needs to be clarified; this is to ensure that we provide you with the information you require.
Please note that some information you have requested may not be provided to you; this will only be information that can be withheld by law. In most cases the reasons will be explained to you along with your copy of any information that can be released to you.
Yours faithfully,
Jane Jones
Information Governance Administrative Officer
Legal Services
6th Floor
Mulberry Place
London E14 2BG
0207 364 4736
Dear Rupna Khanam,
I note that the 20 working day deadline has passed without any response being provided to my FOI Request.
This is very disappointing.
The Request was a straight forward one, and I see no reason why the council could not provider its response within the statutory limit of 20wd.
Please give an indication of a date by when the council expects to provide its reply - as otherwise a reference to the ICO will become necessary.
Yours sincerely,
James Muldoon
Dear Sir/Madam
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000 - IGT_FOI_02_2704 - Request handling, Data for
Jan 2009 - Jan 2010 inclusive
Your request for information has been considered under the requirements of
the Freedom of Information Act and the information can be found at.
Insert link
You can also search our Disclosure Log for any specific topics of interest
[1]http://towerhamletsfoi.org.uk/disclosure...
Complete our Customer Satisfation Survey
Tower Hamlets is committed to giving you the best possible service. It is
only by listening to your views that we can find out what we are doing
well and what needs to improve.
We are continuously looking at ways in which to improve our services and
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If you have any queries please get in touch with me to discuss them. You
might like to know that the Council's website [3]www.towerhamlets.gov.uk
contains a section on the Freedom of Information Act that lists other
publications readily available from the Council under its Publication
Scheme.
Yours faithfully
Jane Jones
Information Governance Administrative Officer
Legal Services
6th Floor
Mulberry Place
London E14 2BG
0207 364 4736
[4][email address]
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If you unhappy with this response or wish to complain about any aspect of
the handling of this request please write to:
Corporate Complaints Unit
Tower Hamlets Town Hall
Mulberry Place
5 Clove Crescent
London E14 2BG
If you are subsequently not satisfied with the Council's response to your
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Commissioner at:
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Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire SK9 5AF
Telephone: 01625 545 700
[6]www.informationcommissioner.gov.uk
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References
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4. mailto:[email address]
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8. http://www.towerhamlets.gov.uk/
9. mailto:[Tower Hamlets Borough Council request email]
Dear Jane L Jones,
Thank you for your reply - which does include useful information.
(1) Could you clarify the column headings.
What does Duration refer to - is it the number of calendar days, or working days, or something else?
I think, for clarify, you should record the actual date of response.
(2) I note that your 908 entries stop at 1-1-10, when my FOI Request included the whole of Jan 2010.
Could you add the missing data?
(3) I am conducting research into the ways that councils in London handle FOI Requests.
I made the same request as I made to you to each of the 33 London boroughs, and to TfL and the GLA.
I need to import the data into a spreadsheet.
Unfortunately the PDF file you have provided does not allow me to do this.
Could you kindly supply me the data as an XLS spreadsheet - as I did in fact originally request?
(4) As to Q3, on the assumption that your Duration column is in fact the number of Working Days to the final response, it is a simple arithmetic process to find the answers.
This could hardly take long to calculate.
However if you provide me with the XLS spreadsheet I have asked for, I can re-sort the data by Duration, and then find the answers to Q3 in less than 15 minutes.
(5) As to Q4, all you would need to do is to check the outcome of each case, and enter this into the spreadsheet I ask for.
Under ICO and MoJ guidance, councils are required to log their FOI requests so that they can report on them.
I note what another person has written to another council, as per the weblink below.
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/tr...
I suggest Tower Hamlets Council needs to review the way it handles and records FOI Requests.
The guidance suggests that my information should then be a simple matter to provide.
I note your duty to assist under §16 of the Act, and note that you have failed to offer any way forward.
Bearing in mind the council's duty to assist, and the fact that the council could provide the information requested by searching its records and extracting what is asked for, perhaps you could provide an estimate for the time required to provide missing data. I can then refine my FOI to come within the relevant limit.
If that would be overly onerous, then kindly provide a simple XLS spreadsheet which contains all FOI Requests received during the time period, including all the information requested which the council has recorded, and from which I can extract the relevant data.
Yours sincerely,
James Muldoon
Dear Mr Muldoon
Thank you for your email. Please see our response below to your questions
in relation to your FOI request.
(1) Could you clarify the column headings.
What does Duration refer to - is it the number of calendar days,
or working days, or something else?
Answer: Number of working days.
I think, for clarify, you should record the actual date of
response.
Answer: The system we use does not give us the option on reporting on
actual days closed. To do this we would need to go into each individual
request and obtain the date that way. However, this could easily be
calculated from the 'Date Raised' (which is the date the request was
logged) and 'Duration' from the information that has been provided to you.
(2) I note that your 908 entries stop at 1-1-10, when my FOI
Request included the whole of Jan 2010.
Could you add the missing data?
Answer: We have now included the requests for January on the attached
spreadsheet.
<<FOI requests from 01 01 09-31 01 2010.xls>>
(3) I am conducting research into the ways that councils in London
handle FOI Requests.
I made the same request as I made to you to each of the 33 London
boroughs, and to TfL and the GLA.
I need to import the data into a spreadsheet.
Unfortunately the PDF file you have provided does not allow me to
do this.
Could you kindly supply me the data as an XLS spreadsheet - as I
did in fact originally request?
Answer: Please find attached information in the requested format.
(4) As to Q3, on the assumption that your Duration column is in
fact the number of Working Days to the final response, it is a
simple arithmetic process to find the answers.
This could hardly take long to calculate.
However if you provide me with the XLS spreadsheet I have asked
for, I can re-sort the data by Duration, and then find the answers
to Q3 in less than 15 minutes.
Answer: Please find attached information in the requested format.
(5) As to Q4, all you would need to do is to check the outcome of
each case, and enter this into the spreadsheet I ask for.
Under ICO and MoJ guidance, councils are required to log their FOI
requests so that they can report on them.
I note what another person has written to another council, as per
the weblink below.
[1]http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/tr...
I suggest Tower Hamlets Council needs to review the way it handles
and records FOI Requests.
The guidance suggests that my information should then be a simple
matter to provide.
I note your duty to assist under §16 of the Act, and note that you
have failed to offer any way forward.
Bearing in mind the council's duty to assist, and the fact that the
council could provide the information requested by searching its
records and extracting what is asked for, perhaps you could provide
an estimate for the time required to provide missing data. I can
then refine my FOI to come within the relevant limit.
If that would be overly onerous, then kindly provide a simple XLS
spreadsheet which contains all FOI Requests received during the
time period, including all the information requested which the
council has recorded, and from which I can extract the relevant
data.
Answer: This option is not available on our systems reporting tool. In
order to provide this information we will have to go through each
individual 993 requests to obtain this information which will take us
above the appropriate limit of 18 hours as described in s.12 of the Act .
Therefore this information is exempt under s.12 Exemption where cost of
compliance exceeds appropriate limit, of the Freedom of Information Act
Under section 12 of the Act, the Council is not obliged to comply
with this part of the request if the Council estimates that the costs
of complying with the request would exceed the appropriate limit.
The Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and
Fees) Regulations 2004 has set the appropriate limit as £450 based on a
charge at £25 per hour.
We have calculated that it would take 5 min maximum to obtain this
information from each request- as we will have to go into each individual
request and take out the information and upload it onto the spreadsheet.
To go through all 993 requests it would take one officer 82 hours in
total. This is far in excess of the appropriate limit of 18 hours.
You may wish to narrow or re-submit your request so that it falls within
the appropriate limit.
If you are unhappy with this response or wish to complain about any aspect
of the handling of this request please write to:
Corporate Complaints Unit
Tower Hamlets Town Hall
Mulberry Place
5 Clove Crescent
London E14 2BG
If you are subsequently not satisfied with the Council's response to your
complaint you have a right of appeal to the independent Information
Commissioner at:
Information Commissioner's Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire SK9 5AF
Telephone: 01625 545 700
[6]www.informationcommissioner.gov.uk
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