Heritage management plans

The request was refused by HM Revenue and Customs.

Dear HM Revenue and Customs,

Dear Natural England,

I am writing to request, under environmental information regulations, copies of the “heritage landscape management plans” or “heritage management plans” for the following properties:

Bolton Abbey Estate (Yorkshire)
Chatsworth Estate (Derbyshire)
Firle Estate (East Sussex)
Raby Castle (Co. Durham)
Alnwick Castle (Northumberland)

I make this request subject to the following additional comments:

1) I note that guidance identifies that the conditionally exempt heritage assets scheme applies only where property falls within the below criteria:
“The assets must be one of the following:
- buildings, estates or parklands of outstanding historical or architectural interest
- land of outstanding natural beauty and spectacular views
- land of outstanding scientific interest including special areas for the conservation of wildlife, plants and trees
- objects with national scientific, historic or artistic interest, either in their own right or due to a connection with historical buildings”
All the estates I have requested information on fall, I believe, within the ‘outstanding natural beauty’ or ‘ outstanding scientific interest including special areas for the conservation of wildlife, plants and trees’ - I therefore believe that the information requested, including management of these natural heritage assets, qualifies as environmental information under the appropriate legislation. Existing guidance states that:

“If information is environmental then the request must be handled under the Environmental
Information Regulations (EIR). There is no equivalent of section 44 in the EIR. Instead, regulation 5(6) of the EIR says that "any enactment or rule of law that would prevent the disclosure of information in accordance with these Regulations shall not apply". Therefore a statutory bar in other legislation cannot prevent the disclosure of environmental information under the EIR. The information must be disclosed unless it is exempt by virtue of an exception in the EIR themselves.”

2) I note, additionally, that:
“Natural England offers up to 50% grant funding towards the eligible cost of preparing an HMP for land of outstanding scenic, historic or scientific interest in England”
I therefore contend that the use of public money in preparation of these management plans signifies an issue of public interest that justifies disclosure of the information.

3) Further, the basis of the heritage assets conditional exemption scheme qualifies estates for significant financial benefits through exemption from inheritance taxes. It is therefore clearly a matter of pubic interest that such plans are available to the public in order to allow the public to understand what undertakings have been made in return for tax exemption and how these heritage assets will be managed.

4) A further important consideration is that a common undertaking in conditionally exempt agreements is one of public access to the relevant heritage assets, there is therefore a clear public interest in identifying both the assets to which access has been granted and the nature of how they will be managed and made accessible, in order for the public to assess both value for money in return for ram exemption and compliance with both formal undertakings and agreed management plans. Without access to the heritage management plan, the public have little or no way of applying transparency and public oversight to decisions made on their behalf by Natural England and HMRC.

5) I confirm that I am happy for redactions of personal information that would otherwise have any bearing on release.

Yours faithfully,

Kieran Foster

FOI Central Team, HM Revenue and Customs

Our ref: EIR2021/31915

Dear Mr Foster,

Freedom of Information Act 2000 Acknowledgement

Thank you for your communication of 30 December.

We have allocated the above reference which you should quote if you need
to contact us.

We will arrange for a reply to be sent to you which will either comply
with our obligations under Freedom of Information Act or, if we think it's
an enquiry that we don't need to address under the terms of the Act, let
you know why. If it is the latter we will, if possible, pass it on to a
more appropriate part of the Department for answer.

While we aim to respond to all freedom of information requests within 20
working days, if for some reason this timescale cannot be complied with,
we will, where possible, write to you explaining the reason for the delay
and provide an estimated time for response.

Yours sincerely

HMRC Freedom of Information Team

FOI Central Team, HM Revenue and Customs

1 Attachment

Dear Mr Foster,

We are writing in response to your request for information, received 30
December.

Yours sincerely,

HMRC Freedom of Information Team

Dear HM Revenue and Customs,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of HM Revenue and Customs's handling of my FOI request 'Heritage management plans'.

The request was refused under regulation 12(5)(d) of the EIR.

“We can confirm we hold the information you seek, but we consider it exempt from disclosure under regulation 12(5)(d) of the EIR. This regulation provides an exception to the duty to disclose, subject to public interest considerations.”

I believe, firstly, that this exception has been incorrectly applied

Regulation 12(5)(d) provides that an authority “may refuse to disclose information to the extent that its disclosure would adversely affect”
(d) the confidentiality of the proceedings of that or any other public authority where such confidentiality is provided by law;

I believe that concerns over confidentiality could be addressed by appropriate redactions of confidential information (contact details etc.) rather than blanket refusal. I contend that 12(5)(d) Does not permit blanket refusal, only refusal of provision of information that could reasonably be seen as confidential. Regulation 11 specifically states that “Nothing in these Regulations shall authorise a refusal to make available any environmental information contained in or otherwise held with other information which is withheld by virtue of these Regulations unless it is not reasonably capable of being separated from the other information for the purpose of making available that information”

I also believe that the reliance on confidentiality is significantly diminished by the fact that the existence of conditionally exempt tax agreements for all the identified properties is an existing matter of public record, and advertised on HMRC website: http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/gds/heritage/lbse...

HMRC justify their refusal based on principle that “The CRCA imposes a statutory duty on us not to disclose taxpayer information. This creates an expectation of confidentiality. Disclosing the information requested would undermine this expectation and could adversely affect our ability to carry out our statutory functions”

However, HMRC has already brought the existence these agreements, and the identity of the taxpayers involved, into the public realm. Following HMRC’s inferred principle of ‘complete confidentiality’ applying to taxation/taxpayer information then the existing release of this information via HMRC website would in itself constitute a breach of HMRC’s legal duties. After releasing this information themselves, they cannot continue to claim that there is an enduring “expectation of confidentiality” on any and all information that flows from these agreements.

In effect the ‘general duty of confidentiality’ regards these agreements and their contents (rather than protection of specific confidential details such as personal information, which I have already stated that I understand may need to be subject to appropriate redactions) has already been dispensed/put aside through their publication on HMRC website.

As a result of bringing the existence of these agreements into the public realm, the public interest is clearly therefore engaged to an extent whereby knowledge not only of the existence of these agreements is in the public interest, but also the details of the undertakings entered into as a result. Otherwise how can the public verify that the conditional agreements entered into on their behalf are being upheld? The very nature of a *conditional* agreement is that specific conditions are entered into in return for tax relief. If those conditions are not being upheld then it is clearly a matter of public interest, and in order to assess that it is clearly also therefore a matter of public interest that those conditions should be available to the public. Similarly, it is important for the public to be able to ascertain whether any monitoring arrangements and/or assessment criteria were entered into as part of the agreement in order to assess whether an effective regime was in place to ensure that those conditions were being fulfilled.

As such, I believe the decision to completely withhold information in these cases is not justified and fails to overcome the regulation 12(2) presumption in favour of disclosure.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/h...

Yours faithfully,

kieran foster

FOI Central Team, HM Revenue and Customs

Our ref: IR2022/01023

Dear Mr Foster,

Freedom of Information Act 2000 Acknowledgement

Thank you for your communication of 20 January.

We have allocated the above reference which you should quote if you need
to contact us.

We will arrange for a reply to be sent to you which will either comply
with our obligations under Freedom of Information Act or, if we think it's
an enquiry that we don't need to address under the terms of the Act, let
you know why. If it is the latter we will, if possible, pass it on to a
more appropriate part of the Department for answer.

While we aim to r espond to all freedom of information requests within 20
working days, if for some reason this timescale cannot be complied with,
we will, where possible, write to you explaining the reason for the delay
and provide an estimated time for response.

Yours sincerely

HMRC Freedom of Information Team

FOI Central Team, HM Revenue and Customs

1 Attachment

Dear Mr Foster,

We are writing in response to your request for information, received 20
January.

Yours sincerely,

HMRC Freedom of Information Team