Informatioin requests, enforcement notices and practice recommendations ... against Northumbria Police

Martin McGartland made this Freedom of Information request to Information Commissioner's Office This request has been closed to new correspondence. Contact us if you think it should be reopened.

The request was successful.

Martin McGartland

Martin McGartland

09 January 2017

Dear Information Commissioner’s Office,

Under the Freedom of Information Act I would like all recorded information concerning following;

1. Number of times during past 4 years the ICO have served information notices requiring Northumbria Police to provide the ICO with specified information within a certain time period?

2. Number of times during past 4 years the ICO have issued undertakings committing Northumbria Police to a particular course of action to improve its compliance?

3. Number, if any, of enforcement notices which have been served against Northumbria Police during past 4 years where there has been a breach of the Act, requiring Northumbria Police to take (or refrain from taking) specified steps in order to ensure they comply with the law?

4. What were the reasons behind each enforcement notice served on Northumbria Police during past 4 years? Please also disclose date/s of each enforcement notice.

5. Number of times, if any, during past 4 years that the ICO have issued practice recommendations specifying steps the Northumbria Police should take to ensure conformity to the codes? Please also disclose date/s when each practice recommendations were issued.

6. Regards 5 above, please supply details and reason/s for all/any practice recommendations issued by ICO against Northumbria Police during the past 4 years.

7. Have Northumbria Police ever been investigated and or prosecuted by ICO concerning possible criminal offences under the Act ? If so please also supply full details of all, any cases as well as the date/s of each case.

8. Number of times, if any, the ICO have reported Northumbria Police to Parliament on freedom of information issues of concern during the past 4 years? If ICO have reported the force to Parliament please supply full details, of each, every case.

9. Number of times, if any, that ICO and or its staff have have had to issue verbal practice and or any other sort of recommendations and or warnings to Northumbria Police relating to breaches of the FOIA and DPA during past 4 years? Please supply all dates, reasons for each, every verbal practice or any other sort of recommendations, warnings etc.

10. How many cases are the ICO aware of relating to Northumbria Police have delayed answering subject access request/s by 1 year or more. Please supply full details of what action, if any, the ICO have taken against them for not complying with the Act.

11. What action do ICO take and or have taken against any public authorities who have delayed replying to subject access requests for 1 year or longer? Please supply all information the ICO hold relating to all, any cases as well as the dates (for any cases during past 4 years).

Yours faithfully,

Martin McGartland

AccessICOinformation, Information Commissioner's Office

Thank you for contacting the Information Commissioner’s Office. We confirm
that we have received your correspondence.

 

If you have made a request for information held by the ICO we will contact
you as soon as possible if we need any further information to enable us to
answer your request. If we don't need any further information we will
respond to you within our published, and statutory, service levels. For
more information please visit [1]http://ico.org.uk/about_us/how_we_comply

 

If you have raised a new information rights concern - we aim to send you
an initial response and case reference number within 30 days.

 

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raised it with the organisation first. For more information please see our
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follow the link ‘for the public’). You can also call the number below.

 

If you have requested advice - we aim to respond within 14 days.

 

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Yours sincerely

 

The Information Commissioner’s Office

 

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Information Commissioner's Office

6 February 2017

 

Case Reference Number IRQ0662352

Dear Mr McGartland
 
Request for information
 
Further to our acknowledgement, we are now in a position to provide you
with a response to your request for information.
 
We have dealt with your request in accordance with your ‘right to know’
under section 1(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA), which
entitles you to be provided with any information ‘held’ by a public
authority, unless an appropriate exemption applies.
 
Request
 
In your email of 9 January 2017 you asked us to provide you with the
following information:
 
“Under the Freedom of Information Act I would like all recorded
information concerning following;

1. Number of times during past 4 years the ICO have served information
notices requiring Northumbria Police to provide the ICO with specified
information within a certain time period?

2. Number of times during past 4 years the ICO have issued undertakings
committing Northumbria Police to a particular course of action to improve
its compliance?

3. Number, if any, of enforcement notices which have been served against
Northumbria Police during past 4 years where there has been a breach of
the Act, requiring Northumbria Police to take (or refrain from taking)
specified steps in order to ensure they comply with the law?

4. What were the reasons behind each enforcement notice served on
Northumbria Police during past 4 years? Please also disclose date/s of
each enforcement notice.

5. Number of times, if any, during past 4 years that the ICO have issued
practice recommendations specifying steps the Northumbria Police should
take to ensure conformity to the codes? Please also disclose date/s when
each practice recommendations were issued.

6. Regards 5 above, please supply details and reason/s for all/any
practice recommendations issued by ICO against Northumbria Police during
the past 4 years.

7. Have Northumbria Police ever been investigated and or prosecuted by ICO
concerning possible criminal offences under the Act ? If so please also
supply full details of all, any cases as well as the date/s of each case.

8. Number of times, if any, the ICO have reported Northumbria Police to
Parliament on freedom of information issues of concern during the past 4
years? If ICO have reported the force to Parliament please supply full
details, of each, every case.

9. Number of times, if any, that ICO and or its staff have have had to
issue verbal practice and or any other sort of recommendations and or
warnings to Northumbria Police relating to breaches of the FOIA and DPA
during past 4 years? Please supply all dates, reasons for each, every
verbal practice or any other sort of recommendations, warnings etc.

10. How many cases are the ICO aware of relating to Northumbria Police
have delayed answering subject access request/s by 1 year or more. Please
supply full details of what action, if any, the ICO have taken against
them for not complying with the Act.

11. What action do ICO take and or have taken against any public
authorities who have delayed replying to subject access requests for 1
year or longer? Please supply all information the ICO hold relating to
all, any cases as well as the dates (for any cases during past 4 years).”
 
 
Our response
 
Please find below some of the information covered by your request:
 
1. Number of times during past 4 years the ICO have served information
notices requiring Northumbria Police to provide the ICO with specified
information within a certain time period?
 
There have been no information notices issued within the past four years.

2. Number of times during past 4 years the ICO have issued undertakings
committing Northumbria Police to a particular course of action to improve
its compliance?
 
There have been no undertakings issued during the past four years.

3. Number, if any, of enforcement notices which have been served against
Northumbria Police during past 4 years where there has been a breach of
the Act, requiring Northumbria Police to take (or refrain from taking)
specified steps in order to ensure they comply with the law?
 
There have been no enforcement notices issued within the past four years.

4. What were the reasons behind each enforcement notice served on
Northumbria Police during past 4 years? Please also disclose date/s of
each enforcement notice.
 
We do not hold this information because there have been no enforcement
notices.

5. Number of times, if any, during past 4 years that the ICO have issued
practice recommendations specifying steps the Northumbria Police should
take to ensure conformity to the codes? Please also disclose date/s when
each practice recommendations were issued.
 
There have been no practice recommendations, therefore no information is
held.

6. Regards 5 above, please supply details and reason/s for all/any
practice recommendations issued by ICO against Northumbria Police during
the past 4 years. 
 
Information not held (as above).

7. Have Northumbria Police ever been investigated and or prosecuted by ICO
concerning possible criminal offences under the Act? If so please also
supply full details of all, any cases as well as the date/s of each case.
 
There have been no investigations/prosecutions by the ICO.

8. Number of times, if any, the ICO have reported Northumbria Police to
Parliament on freedom of information issues of concern during the past 4
years? If ICO have reported the force to Parliament please supply full
details, of each, every case. 
 
None.

9. Number of times, if any, that ICO and or its staff have have had to
issue verbal practice and or any other sort of recommendations and or
warnings to Northumbria Police relating to breaches of the FOIA and DPA
during past 4 years? Please supply all dates, reasons for each, every
verbal practice or any other sort of recommendations, warnings etc.

This information is not held. The FOIA only applies to recorded
information. Any recommendations or warnings would be recorded by the
ICO.  
 
10. How many cases are the ICO aware of relating to Northumbria Police
have delayed answering subject access request/s by 1 year or more. Please
supply full details of what action, if any, the ICO have taken against
them for not complying with the Act.
 
Although we hold 18 completed cases about Northumbria Police where the
nature is ‘subject access request’ and we have made assessments under
section 42 of the DPA, we have identified one case where Northumbria
Police has not fully complied with a subject access request for over a
year. The action the ICO has taken is to ask for fortnightly updates which
are ongoing.
 
In cases where there was a delay in complying within the 40 days
Northumbria Police was advised to ensure that in future it complied with
the SAR timeframe and, if relevant, provide any outstanding information to
the data subject. No formal action has been taken.
 
11. What action do ICO take and or have taken against any public
authorities who have delayed replying to subject access requests for 1
year or longer? Please supply all information the ICO hold relating to
all, any cases as well as the dates (for any cases during past 4 years).”
 
Our casework management system does not identify specific cases of this
type. If we did come across an instance of this kind, our role would be to
consider the specific circumstances and take proportionate action – we
could make an assessment decision and ask what the organisation has in
place to avoid this situation happening in the future, or we might
consider more formal action, in line with our regulatory action policy:
 
[1]https://ico.org.uk/media/about-the-ico/p...
 
 
Unfortunately we are not able to provide you with the information you have
requested in the second part of 11).  We are unable to conduct an analysis
in the terms in which you have requested it because the information is not
searchable electronically.  I will explain in more detail below why this
is the case, but in brief, section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act
2000 (FOIA) makes clear that a public authority (such as the Information
Commissioner’s Office – the ICO) is not obliged to comply with an FOIA
request if the authority estimates that the cost of complying with the
request would exceed the ‘appropriate limit'. The ‘appropriate limit’ for
the ICO, as determined in the ‘Freedom of Information and Data Protection
(Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004’ is £450.  We have
determined that £450 would equate to 18 hours of work.
 
Firstly, we make the assumption that you mean data controllers (we do not
differentiate between data controllers and public authorities regarding
the data protection cases we assess).  If you are only interested in the
compliance of public authorities with the DPA in relation to subject
access requests, we cannot conduct this search electronically for this
reason.  
 
Additionally, although we hold information about requests for assessment
(known as RFAs), it is not possible to conduct an electronic search to
tell whether a data controller has taken more than a year to respond to a
subject access request.
 
In order to find every instance from the information we hold we would need
to individually check each case for every complaint/concern we have
received. Generally speaking we hold cases for two years on our electronic
case management system.  Having checked our case management system for
broad figures, for example just one month - 1 December 2016 to 1 January
2017 - we completed 409 DPA cases where the ‘nature’ was ‘subject access
request’. It would take a minimum of three minutes to look at each case
(and in some cases it would take much longer). This means that it would
take us over 20 hours to assess one month’s cases alone. This is beyond
the fees’ limit and would provide you with only a very small sample of
what you have requested.
 
In order to provide you with advice and assistance, it might help to
explain what we are able to provide you with. Due to our retention policy,
our case management system only holds complete figures from 1 April 2014.
If you can narrow your request to named organisation/s we may be able to
provide a response regarding subject access requests and delays of one
year or longer. Should you wish the ICO to carry out this search, please
let us know.
 
Any reformulated request you may wish to make to the ICO will be treated
as a new FOI request, and the 20 working day time limit will begin again.
 
Review procedure
 
I hope this provides you with the information you require.  However, if
you are dissatisfied with this response and wish to request a review of
our decision or make a complaint about how your request has been handled
you should write to the Information Access Team at the address below or
email [2][ICO request email]
 
Your request for internal review should be submitted to us within 40
working days of receipt by you of this response.  Any such request
received after this time will only be considered at the discretion of the
Commissioner.
 
If having exhausted the review process you are not content that your
request or review has been dealt with correctly, you have a further right
of appeal to this office in our capacity as the statutory complaint
handler under the legislation.  To make such an application, please write
to our Customer Contact Team, at the address given or visit the
‘Complaints’ section of our website to make a Freedom of Information Act
or Environmental Information Regulations complaint online.
 
A copy of our review procedure can be accessed from our website
[3]here  .
 
Yours sincerely
 
Janine Gregory
Lead Information Access Officer
Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow,
Cheshire SK9 5AF
T. 0303 123 1113 F. 01625 524510  [4]ico.org.uk  [5]twitter.com/iconews
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The ICO's mission is to uphold information rights in the public interest.
To find out more about our work please visit our website, or subscribe to
our e-newsletter at ico.org.uk/newsletter.

If you are not the intended recipient of this email (and any attachment),
please inform the sender by return email and destroy all copies without
passing to any third parties.

If you'd like us to communicate with you in a particular way please do let
us know, or for more information about things to consider when
communicating with us by email, visit ico.org.uk/email

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Martin McGartland (Account suspended) left an annotation ()

25 Years of Serious CORRUPTION by Northumbria Police - from the very Top down - in the Martin McGartland cases ....
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