Legal Dept
Dear Essex County Council,
1) Please provide information relating to your relationship/contract with Public Law Partnership and details of when the contract started, if it has been renewed and when it will expire (if not renewed) and the annual cost for each of the last 3 years.
a) Please advise if all solicitors working for Essex Country Council are either employed and contracted by Essex County Council or Public Law Partnership
b) Please provide information relating to whether any members of the Essex Country Council legal services department also work for/on behalf of Southend City Council and whether the number of staff this applies to is on an individual basis or whole teams which act/represent both Southend City Council and Essex County Council in matters.
2) Please provide information such as policy documents or guidance issued to solicitors with conduct of cases in Care Proceedings on instructing external representation/Counsel for hearings (such as preferred Chambers and barristers)
a. Please provide the number of 'solicitor advocates' within the legal department whom act on behalf of Essex County Council at court hearings
b. Please provide all the genre/class/type of court hearings Essex County Council has used in-house representation i.e. solicitors advocates in the last 12 months (such as in housing matters, child Care Proceedings etc).
3) Please provide a list of all the names of the IT systems and software used by employees of the legal services department
I trust this will fall under £450, if not, please choose to supply the information up to the amount of £450.
Yours faithfully,
Alison Melville
Dear Sir/Madam,
Thank you for your request for an Internal Review. Please find our
response to your request on the accompanying document(s).
If you are not satisfied with this response and wish to make a complaint,
you can find the details at
http://www.essex.gov.uk/customer-service...
If, after following our complaints procedure, you are still not satisfied,
you are entitled to ask the Information Commissioner to review our
decision. You can contact the Information Commissioner at Wycliffe House,
Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF; Telephone 0303 123 1113.
Yours sincerely,
Naomi Hinder
Your Right to Know
Essex County Council
Telephone: 033301 38989
E-mail: [email address]
Dear Sir/Madam,
Thank you for your recent request for information.
Your request is covered by the Freedom of Information Act, which requires us to respond within 20 working days.
We will determine and let you know whether we hold the information you have requested and consider whether we are able to release the information or if it is exempt from disclosure.
ECC does not usually charge for providing information to its requestors as the provision of electronic copies is negligible, however under certain circumstances we may have to do so if providing the information costs more than £25. We will let you know before we do any work that would incur a charge.
Please note that the response and data released to you as part of this request will be published on the Essex County Council website. The website address is https://secureapps.essex.gov.uk/Freedom_.... All requests will be anonymised and no personal information including contact details will be disclosed as part of this process.
Please contact me if you would like further advice or assistance about your request, or your right to access information held by Essex County Council.
Yours sincerely,
Naomi Hinder
Your Right to Know
Essex County Council
Telephone: 033301 38989
E-mail: [email address]
Dear Sir/Madam,
Thank you for your request for information. Please find our response to
your request on the accompanying document(s).
I trust that this information satisfies your request. However, should you
require anything further, please contact me and I will endeavour to assist
you further.
If you are not satisfied with your response, please contact me so I can
try to resolve the issue. Alternatively, if you wish to make a complaint,
you can find the details at
https://www.essex.gov.uk/Your-Council/Yo...
If, after following our complaints procedure, you are still not satisfied,
you are entitled to ask the Information Commissioner to review our
decision. You can contact the Information Commissioner at Wycliffe House,
Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF; Telephone 0303 123 1113.
Please note that the response and data released to you as part of this
request will be published on the Essex County Council website. The website
address is
https://www.essex.gov.uk/Your-Council/Yo....
All requests will be anonymised and no personal information including
contact details will be disclosed as part of this process.
If you would like to take a short customer satisfaction survey please use
the link below
https://consultations.essex.gov.uk/infor...
Naomi Hinder
Your Right to Know
Essex County Council
Telephone: 033301 38989
E-mail: [email address]
Dear Essex County Council,
Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.
I am writing to request an internal review of Essex County Council's handling of my FOI request 'Legal Dept'.
May I remind you that the FOI Act requires an 'applicant blind' approach, which is to say that it embodies the principle that information is available to anyone and requests must be assessed without consideration of who made them. Contrary to the ICO's guidance (see https://ico.org.uk/media/for-organisatio...), your decision has been influenced by your knowledge or view of me as the requester, rather than an assessment of the request in isolation.
For that reason I am asking you to review your response and, if the exemption is upheld, to provide an assessment which does not take your knowledge of the requester into consideration.
May I also remind you that refusing a request for the reason that it constitutes a 'fishing expedition' is something that ICO guidance says "public authorities should consider very carefully, as regular use could easily result in the refusal of legitimate requests" and that "fishing for information is not, in itself, enough to make a request vexatious". (https://ico.org.uk/media/for-organisatio...)
I would like to point out that although I have previously made requests for similar information, I am now requesting something demonstrably different.
While my request is one of several, I would like to challenge the assessment that my activity is vexatious.
A full history of my FOI request and correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/l...
Yours faithfully,
Alison Melville
Good Morning,
Please can you provide the ECC reference number this request relates to.
Kind regards,
Daniel Cuthbert
Your Right To Know
External IG Team
Democracy and Transparency
Corporate and Customer Services
Essex County Council
T: 03330 134925
E: [email address]
W: www.essex.gov.uk
Dear Your Right To Know,
I refer you to the last line of my previous email where you will find the ECC reference number as a full history of my FOI request and correspondence is available on the Internet for which a link is provided.
Yours sincerely,
Alison Melville
Dear Sir or Madam,
Your Internal Review Request:
Thank you for your request to review our handling of your recent request for information reference ECC14399109 03 23, received by us on 08/03/23 .
We will review the handling of your request and respond with our formal decision on the aspects you have asked us to consider within 20 working days.
Please contact me if you would like further advice or assistance about your request, review or your right to access information held by us.
Yours sincerely,
Naomi Hinder
Your Right To Know
Essex County Council
T: 033301 38989
E: [email address]
W: www.essex.gov.uk
Please consider the environment before printing this e-mail
Dear Sir/Madam,
Thank you for your request for an Internal Review. Please find our
response to your request on the accompanying document(s).
If you are not satisfied with this response and wish to make a complaint,
you can find the details at
http://www.essex.gov.uk/customer-service...
If, after following our complaints procedure, you are still not satisfied,
you are entitled to ask the Information Commissioner to review our
decision. You can contact the Information Commissioner at Wycliffe House,
Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF; Telephone 0303 123 1113.
Yours sincerely,
Naomi Hinder
Your Right to Know
Essex County Council
Telephone: 033301 38989
E-mail: [email address]
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