Islington Town Hall Auditorium refurbishment
Alex Skene made this Freedom of Information request to Islington Borough Council This request has been closed to new correspondence. Contact us if you think it should be reopened.
Dear Sir or Madam,
I would be very grateful if you could provide the following:
1. Copy of the contract with Diamond Build Plc for the refurbishment of the Islington Town Hall Auditorium.
2. Details of the "additional works to the Islington Town Hall Auditorium up to a maximum of £400,000" [1]
3. Copy of the tender analysis report from Mouchel (project architects)
Yours faithfully,
Alex Skene
Dear Sir or Madam,
Please could you provide an update to an FOI request I sent on 13 March which is now overdue.
The information I requested was:
1. Copy of the contract with Diamond Build Plc for the
refurbishment of the Islington Town Hall Auditorium.
2. Details of the "additional works to the Islington Town Hall Auditorium up to a maximum of £400,000" [1]
3. Copy of the tender analysis report from Mouchel (project architects)
[1] http://www.islington.gov.uk/democracy/do...
The original FOI request can be seen here: http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/is...
Yours sincerely,
Alex Skene
Good afternoon
Please find the attached response to your recent Freedom of Information
request. Please do not hesitate to contact me if I can be of any further
assistance.
Regards
Ailsa Mechen
Business Development Officer
Finance Department
Second Floor
7 Newington Barrow Way
London
N7 7EP
T: 020 7527 2805
F: 020 7527 2882
E: [1][email address]
W: [2]www.islington.gov.uk
References
Visible links
1. mailto:[email address]
2. http://www.islington.gov.uk/
3. http://www.islington.gov.uk/freedomofinf...
4. mailto:[Islington Borough Council request email]
5. http://www.islington.gov.uk/
Dear Sir/Madam,
FOI ref 244063
Correspondence: http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/is...
Please pass on my thanks for all the information provided so far. I have a few queries with how you've handled my request, and would like to request an internal review.
- Responses to requests (1) & (3): As you have withheld some information under FOIA Section 43, you have forgotten to include the prejudice & public interest tests required under Section 17(3) of the Act, I would therefore like you to review your decision to withhold information. In addition, for (1) it is likely that this contract would be made available to the public for inspection uncensored, under the rules of the Audit Commission Act 1998.
- Redactions to (1): It is very hard to determine which information was withheld, I would be very grateful if you could point out the pages or sections where redaction took place.
- Your reply to (2): The document "Scoring Report.doc" states the following:
"Given the keenness of tenders received consideration for inclusion of the following should now be considered:
Upgrading of dressing rooms and improvements to first floor toilet area's. Replacement of stage curtains rather than simple clean, Higher specification for audio visual use, upgrading of heating rather than overhaul. Provision of solar panelling etc.
In addition it is anticipated some downtime could occur due to the sensitive location of the work and additional funds would allow `downtime' and potential night working to alleviate potential nuisance whilst operating from set normal working hour arrangements"
Is this part of the additional £400,000 to be set aside? If so, you do hold the information, and I would like you to review what else you may hold on this.
I would be very grateful if you could acknowledge this request for internal review.
Kind regards,
Alex Skene
Dear Alex,
My apologies for only getting back to you today, I have only just received
this - for some reason your request had been identified as spam. This is
to inform you that I will be looking at these matters as part of a review
of how this request was dealt with.
Yours sincerely,
Jeremy
Chief Information Officer
Dear Alex,
This is in response to your request for an internal review of how we responded to your Freedom of Information request (our reference 244063). In addition, you raised specific questions about the Council's response.
Firstly I have examined some of the process issues on this request. The response was provided after the statutory limit of 20 working days and is therefore a breach of the Act. Our standard practice is to acknowledge all requests and provide the requestor with a Freedom of Information Reference number. In terms of compliance, the Council takes the matter of compliance very seriously, with regular Freedom of Information Compliance reports going to our Corporate Management Board and devolved responsibility for coordinating requests within all service areas. We apologise for the fact that a response was made later than the statutory deadline and will continue to monitor our internal processes and feed examples like this back in an attempt to improve our internal mechanisms.
In terms of the information requested:
(a) You asked that we review our decision to withhold information for questions (1) and (3).
I have examined our response to you. I uphold the decision that information should be refused and that our reliance on Section 43 was applicable. In terms of Section 43 we withheld the names of unsuccessful bidders and pricing and rates in the contract. They were withheld because the both the council's and unsuccessful bidders' bargaining positions in future tenders or negotiations could have been adversely affected by this information if disclosed.
(b) You asked if we could indicate what pages or sections where redaction took place.
The following redactions were made:
Appendix A - Page 1 - Names of unsuccessful bidders
Appendix B - Table - Names of unsuccessful bidders
Scoring Report - Pages 1 and 2 - Names of unsuccessful bidders
Section 2 - Page 2 - Rates
Section 4 - Page 14 - Rates
Section 6 - Page 85 - Rates
(c) You asked if inclusions that were described are now part of the £400000 to be set aside. In addition, you asked if we hold the information and that you would like to review what else we may hold on this.
Yes, these inclusions are part of the £400,000. It is expected that the additional works will be agreed in the next 6-8 weeks and this is when we would expect to have clearer information about what these are. In terms of any other information you may still be seeking, it would be useful if you provided more detail so we can obtain this information to you.
I hope that the above clarifies the questions you have raised. If you have a complaint about the handling of this review, you are entitled to raise this with the Information Commissioner's Office at:
Information Commissioner's Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF
Telephone: 01625-545-700
www.ico.gov.uk
Yours sincerely,
Jeremy
Chief Information Officer
Technology Solutions Group
Islington Council
60 Highbury New Park, London, N5 2DJ
Email: [email address]
Web: www.islington.gov.uk
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