Dear Her Majesty's Treasury,

A briefing document from HMT was distributed to MPs prior to the Finance Bill Report Stage debate in the House of Commons on 1st July 2020. This summarised HMT's position in relation to the proposed amendments (tabled by MPs) which were due to be debated on this date. Please supply an exact copy of this briefing document, with all wording unchanged, and indicate the date it was published and distributed to those MPs.

Yours faithfully,

Corinne Booker

Dear Her Majesty's Treasury,

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

I am writing to request an internal review of Her Majesty's Treasury's handling of my FOI request 'HMT Briefing Document (and publication date) distributed to MPs prior to the Finance Bill Report Stage debate in HoC on 1st July 2020'.

On the last day of the legal limit for responding to FOI requests, I received an interim response from the Information Rights Unit, confirming that they have identified information which falls within the scope of my request, but believe this 'may engage the exemption provided for by section 35(1)(a) - formulation and development of Government policy'.

As a result of the above, I have also been informed that the Treasury has not yet resolved the 'different considerations' within the twenty working days which have already passed (although stating that they always aim to do so) and there is now an estimate of another four weeks required in order to undertake the aforementioned exercise.

I feel it is necessary to challenge both of these claims at this juncture - firstly, the FOI request relates to the provision of a briefing document distributed to MPs, not a policy document which may or may not be at the formulation or development stage. The legislation relating to this policy is already in place (via the Finance (No.2) Act 2017) and the briefing document referenced in the FOI request contained the Treasury's opinion and view on specific (related) amendments to the Finance Bill 2019-21, which had themselves been tabled by a large number of cross-party MPs supportive of those proposed changes.

Secondly, having already had twenty working days to consider this request, the estimate of another four weeks seems excessive and I would therefore politely request this exercise is expedited to enable a decision to be made within a more appropriate and reasonable time frame.

Thirdly, there are tens of thousands of individuals affected by this legislation, so the 'public interest' in the provision of this briefing document from the Treasury, alongside the other information requested at the same time, would certainly appear to clearly meet the required criteria on numbers alone. One might also assume that the Treasury would be confident in the accuracy and content of their briefing to MPs and therefore have no issue in demonstrating complete transparency by releasing that in to the public domain.

I await your considered response.

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,

Corinne Booker

Dear FOI Requests,

Thank you for confirming you will now initiate an internal review following my previous response.

You reference the Information Commissioner's guidelines in relation to the estimated timeline for this review - may I also request that attention is paid to the good practice outlined for this process on ico.org.uk (under the section 45 code of practice), which clearly states that you should:

* make sure it is a straightforward, single-stage process;
* make a fresh decision based on all the available evidence that is relevant to the date of the request, not
just a review of the first decision;
* ensure the review is done by someone who did not deal with the request, where possible, and preferably
by a more senior member of staff; and
* ensure the review takes no longer than 20 working days in most cases, or 40 in exceptional circumstances (which must be accordingly justified and communicated).

Yours sincerely,

Corinne Booker

Dear HMT (Information Rights Unit),

I acknowledge receipt of your confirmation that, following this internal review, another Treasury colleague conveniently believes your original decision to delay provision of this document was correct.

You comment that the three separate points made in my request for an internal review have been acknowledged, but conspicuously fail to respond directly to any of those points in this reply, merely stating (and repeating) exactly the same justification outlined in your original interim response dated 11 August.

Given your reference to an 'exemption provided for by section 35(1)(a) - formulation and development of Government policy', please could you explain what specific criteria is used in relation to a briefing document (and NOT a policy document) which has been issued to MPs, and how any retrospective categorisation of that document could possibly be considered as 'formulating' or 'developing' Government policy, when that policy is already incorporated within EXISTING legislation?

It seems reasonable (and entirely objective) to conclude that, on the basis of this particular request and how it is being managed internally, there is a concern within the Treasury that the release of this information to the public domain would appear to be against the interests of the Treasury themselves, rather than against the interests of those constituent members of the public represented by the MPs to whom this was sent. I trust that, should this request be delayed any further, the Information Commissioner would duly concur with this evaluation.

In closing, please can you kindly confirm that the time frame referenced in that interim response will therefore still apply - i.e. approximately four weeks from 11 August 2020, with a reply being made sooner if possible as per your publicly stated Treasury commitment to FOI requesters.

Yours sincerely,

Corinne Booker