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Friday. We are closed Saturdays, Sundays and Bank Holidays. 

Kind regards

FOI Team

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Oxfordshire County Council manages your personal information please see
our [2]Privacy Notice.

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Dear Debbie,

The Council considers that your request does not meet the requirements of section 8(1)(d) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA). Section 8(1)(d) provides that a request is only valid if it:

a) Is in writing,
b) States the name of the applicant and an address for correspondence, and
c) Describes the information requested.

In this case, the Council considers that you have not provided a valid name for the purposes of section 8(1)(b). In the following circumstances, a request will not be valid:

1. No name is provided;
2. The request is signed ‘anonymous’ or similar; 3. The request is signed by a name which appears to be pseudonymous, for example ‘Mickey Mouse’; 4. Only the first name of the requestor has been provided; 5. Only the last name of the requestor has been provided; and 6. Only the first name and last initial of the requestor is provided, for example ‘John S’

With this in mind, the Council cannot accept your request until you provide a valid name which provides, at least, the initial of your first name and your full surname, for example ‘Mr J Smith’. Upon receipt of this, the Council will be in a position to progress your request accordingly.

Renata Malinowski
Freedom of Information Support Officer

Voice of the Customer Team
Customers and Organisational Development

Oxfordshire County Council
Email: [email address]
www.oxfordshire.gov.uk

show quoted sections

Our reference: 21384 EIR

Dear Ms Brooks,

Thank you for your request of 09 April 2023 which you asked for the
following information:

Please supply, for the 12 months to 31 March 2023:

- the total number of FOI requests received by Oxfordshire County Council

- the number and percentage responded to in full within the 20 working
days permitted by law

- the total number referred for internal review

- of those submitted for internal review, the number and percentage
responded to in full within the 20 working day permitted by law

- any correspondence with responsible officers regarding any action to
report or to improve the handling of FOI requests in the year to 31 March
2023 - for example that resulted in the decision to post an automated
response advising requestors that the statutory duty of the authority to
respond in 20 days may not be met

- any correspondence with the information commissioner in the year to 31
March 2023 regarding processing delays

Your request is being considered and you will receive the information
requested as soon as possible and in any event within the next 20 working
days in compliance with the Environmental Information Regulations
2004/Freedom of Information Act 2000, unless an exception applies. This
means that the council will respond to you by the end of 10 May 2023.

If appropriate, the information requested can be made available in
alternative formats, including other languages, Braille, large print, and
audiocassette. If you require any of these formats then please let me
know.

Please contact me if you have any have further enquiries about your
request. I would be grateful if you could quote the reference number given
at the top of this email.

Kind regards,

Renata

Renata Malinowski

Freedom of Information Support Officer

Voice of the Customer Team

Customers and Organisational Development

Oxfordshire County Council

Email:  [1]FOI-E&[email address]

[2]www.oxfordshire.gov.uk

This email, including attachments, may contain confidential information.
If you have received it in error, please notify the sender by reply and
delete it immediately. Views expressed by the sender may not be those of
Oxfordshire County Council. Council emails are subject to the Freedom of
Information Act 2000. [3]email disclaimer. For information about how
Oxfordshire County Council manages your personal information please see
our [4]Privacy Notice.

References

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2. http://www.oxfordshire.gov.uk/
3. https://www.oxfordshire.gov.uk/emaildisc...
4. https://www.oxfordshire.gov.uk/council/a...

Our reference: 21384 EIR

Dear Ms Brooks,

Thank you for your request of 09 April 2023 and our sincere apologies for
the delay.  The draft response to your request was accidentally overlooked
due to a clerical error and I now enclose the response.  Should you wish
to query the content of the response you still can do so by requesting an
Internal Review using the contact details at the end of the response.

Please find our response to your questions below in bold:

Please supply, for the 12 months to 31 March 2023:

- the total number of FOI requests received by Oxfordshire County Council

1,637

- the number and percentage responded to in full within the 20 working
days permitted by law

1,494 responded to in full within 20 working day, 91.22%.

- the total number referred for internal review

48

- of those submitted for internal review, the number and percentage
responded to in full within the 20-working day permitted by law

38 responded to in full within 20 working days, 79.16%

- any correspondence with responsible officers regarding any action to
report or to improve the handling of FOI requests in the year to 31 March
2023 - for example that resulted in the decision to post an automated
response advising requestors that the statutory duty of the authority to
respond in 20 days may not be met.

None

- any correspondence with the information commissioner in the year to 31
March 2023 regarding processing delays.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) contacted the Council
regarding delays in relation to 9 requests (1 of these requests was
delayed at the internal review stage as well) on the following dates:

20 May 2022

18 July 2022

29 July 2022

22 August 2022

31 August 2022

5 October 2022

12 October 2022

30 November 2022

14 February 2023

22 March 2023

The correspondence includes personal data, as such the Council is
withholding it under Section 40 Freedom of Information Act 2000, however
please find attached a redacted version of a standard letter sent to the
Council from the ICO. As you’ll note, the ICO directs the Council to
respond to the requester and copy them (the ICO) into the response. As
such, the response to the requester is in most cases the Council’s
response to the ICO as well.

The Council has redacted the following information from the disclosure:

 1. Names the complaint was from,
 2. The reference numbers and
 3. The names, addresses and contact details of some third parties who are
not Council staff

The Council considers that this information is exempt from disclosure
under section 40(2) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (“FOIA”). 
Section 40(2) provides that information shall not be disclosed where it
constitutes the personal data of someone other than the applicant and that
disclosure would satisfy one of the following three conditions:

 1. That disclosure would breach any of the data protection principles or
would do so if the exemptions in section 24(1) of the Data Protection
Act 2018 (manual unstructured data held by public authorities) were
disregarded.;
 2. That the disclosure of the information to a member of the public
otherwise than under this Act would contravene Article 21 of the GDPR
(general processing: right to object to processing); or

3.     That on a request under Article 15(1) of the GDPR (general
processing: right of access by the data subject) for access to personal
data, the information would be withheld in reliance on provision made by
or under section 15, 16 or 26 of, or Schedule 2, 3 or 4 to, the Data
Protection Act 2018, or (b)on a request under section 45(1)(b) of that Act
(law enforcement processing: right of access by the data subject), the
information would be withheld in reliance on subsection (4) of that
section

In this case, the relevant condition is the first condition. 
Specifically, the council considers that the first data protection
principle would be breached; namely, that disclosure of the redacted
information would not be fair for the following reasons:

 1. The reasonable expectations of the data subjects and the nature of the
information itself leads the Council to conclude that the data
subjects could not reasonably expect that this information would be
disclosed;
 2. Neither this, nor similar information has been released into the
public domain by the data subject or anyone else;
 3. That the principles of transparency and accountability under the FOIA
do not override the data subject’s reasonable expectations that this
information would not be disclosed; and
 4. That the legitimate interests in the public having access to this
information do not outweigh the interests in preserving the rights and
freedoms of the data subjects.

In reaching this decision, the Council noted that the following
consequences may occur if this information was disclosed:

 1. Disclosure may lead to the data subjects receiving unwanted and
unnecessary correspondence,
 2. Disclosure of information which leads to the identification of data
subjects who have made confidential disclosures to the Council would
undermine their confidence in that confidential process and
 3. The data subject would not expect this information to be released.

In light of the above, the Council considers it justified to uphold this
exemption by applying redactions to the disclosure.

Internal review

If you are dissatisfied with the service or response to your request, you
can ask for an internal review as follows:

• Contact the Freedom of Information team in Customers and
Organisational Development

[1][Oxfordshire County Council request email] 

• Write to the Freedom of Information team at the FREEPOST address:

Freedom of Information Team
Oxfordshire County Council
FREEPOST RTLL-ECKS-GLUA
Oxford OX1 1YA

If you remain dissatisfied with the handling of your request or complaint,
you have a right to appeal to the Information Commissioner at:

The Information Commissioner's Office,

Wycliffe House,

Water Lane,

Wilmslow,

Cheshire,

SK9 5AF

Telephone: 0303 123 1113

Website: [2]www.ico.gov.uk

Please let me know if you have further enquiries. I would be grateful if
you could use the reference number given at the top of this email.

Yours sincerely,

Renata Malinowski

Freedom of Information Support Officer

Voice of the Customer Team

Customers and Organisational Development

Oxfordshire County Council

Email: [email address]

[3]www.oxfordshire.gov.uk

This email, including attachments, may contain confidential information.
If you have received it in error, please notify the sender by reply and
delete it immediately. Views expressed by the sender may not be those of
Oxfordshire County Council. Council emails are subject to the Freedom of
Information Act 2000. [4]email disclaimer. For information about how
Oxfordshire County Council manages your personal information please see
our [5]Privacy Notice.

References

Visible links
1. mailto:[Oxfordshire County Council request email]
2. http://www.ico.gov.uk/
3. http://www.oxfordshire.gov.uk/
4. https://www.oxfordshire.gov.uk/emaildisc...
5. https://www.oxfordshire.gov.uk/council/a...