Policy on use of discretion on Parking Appeals, Congestion Charge Appeals and ULEZ Appeals

Peter C. Bell made this Freedom of Information request to Transport for London Automatic anti-spam measures are in place for this older request. Please let us know if a further response is expected or if you are having trouble responding.

The request was successful.

Dear Transport for London,

Please provide a copy of the policy (or policies) related to the use of TfL's discretion on Parking Appeals, Congestion Charge Appeals and ULEZ Appeals or representations by motorists.

Please provide your response in electronic form.

If these policies are available on your website, then please provide the URL for each policy.

Yours faithfully,

Peter C. Bell

FOI, Transport for London

Dear Peter C. Bell,

Our ref: FOI-3239-2324

Thank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on 11 December 2023 asking for information about policies on Parking Appeals, Congestion Charge Appeals and ULEZ Appeals.

Your request will be considered in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and our information access policy, and we will issue you with a response by 11 January 2024. We publish a substantial range of information on our website on subjects including operational performance, contracts, expenditure, journey data, governance and our financial performance. This includes data which is frequently asked for in FOI and EIR requests or other public queries. Please check http://www.tfl.gov.uk/corporate/transpar... to see if this helps you.

We will publish anonymised versions of requests and responses on the www.tfl.gov.uk website. We will not publish your name and we will send a copy of the response to you before it is published on our website.

Yours sincerely,

Tahsin Prima
FOI Case Officer
FOI Case Management Team
General Counsel
Transport for London

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FOI, Transport for London

1 Attachment

Dear Peter C. Bell,

 

Our ref: FOI-3239-2324

 

Thank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on 11
December 2023 asking for policies on Parking appeals, Congestion Charge
appeals and ULEZ appeals.

 

Your request has been considered under the requirements of the Freedom of
Information Act 2000 and our information access policy.

 

I can confirm that we do hold the information you require.

 

Please see the answer to a similar request published on the FOI pages of
our website via the following link, which provides the requested data:
[1]https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/transparenc...

 

In accordance with section 21 of the FOI Act, we are not obliged to supply
you with a copy of the requested information as it is already accessible
to you elsewhere.

 

If you are not satisfied with this response please see the attached
information sheet for details of your right to appeal.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

 

 

Tahsin Prima

FOI Case Officer

General Counsel

Transport for London

 

 

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Dear FOI,

Thank you for your response - I have now accessed the Excel spreadsheet of business rules.

The FOI response that you referred me to included the following:

"Anyway, I have come across the attached two documents which show that clearly TfL are conscious of the need to exercise discretion in a consistent manner. Please can you let me have any more recent documents than these ones as the workshop document was produced in March 2019 and the EOPS Schedule in 2013 so may have been supplanted"

But I could not access the two documents that the referrer has mentioned, Are you able to provide me with a copy of the full FOI request, including the documents attached to the request?

Alternatively, could you treat this as a request for the Workshop document from March 2019 and the EOPS Scheduled from 2013.

Thank you.

Yours sincerely,

Peter C. Bell

FOI, Transport for London

Dear Peter C. Bell,

Our ref: FOI-3624-2324

Thank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on 10 January 2024 asking for EOPS and Workshop dcocuments.

Your request will be considered in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and our information access policy, and we will issue you with a response by 06 February 2024. We publish a substantial range of information on our website on subjects including operational performance, contracts, expenditure, journey data, governance and our financial performance. This includes data which is frequently asked for in FOI and EIR requests or other public queries. Please check http://www.tfl.gov.uk/corporate/transpar... to see if this helps you.

We will publish anonymised versions of requests and responses on the www.tfl.gov.uk website. We will not publish your name and we will send a copy of the response to you before it is published on our website.

Yours sincerely,

Tahsin Prima
FOI Case Officer
FOI Case Management Team
General Counsel
Transport for London

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FOI, Transport for London

1 Attachment

Dear Peter C. Bell,

Our ref: FOI-3624-2324

Thank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on 10 January 2024 asking for EOPS and Workshop dcocuments.

Your request has been considered under the requirements of the Environmental Information Regulations (EIRs) and our information access policy.

Unfortunately because of its complexity, we will be unable to resolve your request within the initial statutory 20 working day deadline. To enable us to fully consider your request, in accordance with the EIRs we have had to extend the deadline for providing a response to 40 working days from the date we received your request. The amended date for a final response is now 04 March 2024. We are working hard to ensure that you receive a response before this date.

I apologise for the delay and any inconvenience this may cause you. If you have any queries or would like to discuss your request, please feel free to contact me.

If you are not satisfied with this response, please read the attached help-sheet entitled ‘Your Right to Appeal.’

Yours sincerely,

Tahsin Prima
FOI Case Officer
FOI Case Management Team
General Counsel
Transport for London

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Dear FOI,

Firstly, can I ask why, after advising me that you are considering my request under the Freedom of Information Act (FOI), and providing an initial response under that Act (as confirmed by your several responses above), you are now quoting a regulation under The Environmental Information Regulations 2004 (EIR)? Either the FOI applies or the EIR applies.

In any event, even if the EIR applies (which is not accepted) in order to avail yourself of the additional time in those regulations you must

"reasonably believes that the complexity and volume of the information requested means that it is impracticable either to comply with the request within the earlier period".

You are now claiming that you have a reasonable belief that my request is so complex that it is impractical for you to comply with the request within the original 20 day time limit. I would like to challenge that claim and ask you to state clearly what is it that makes my request (for the disclosure of particular documents you were supplied with in an earlier FOI request) so complex?

In any event, if as you have previously determined, this request falls to be dealt with under FOI then different rules apply. In an FOI case any extension to the original 20 day period for a response can only be extended for you to consider the public interest test (if information falls within the scope of a qualified exemption and additional time is required to consider the public interest test).

Perhaps you would be kind enough to address these points and provide me with a good reason as to why I should not now refer this matter to the ICO as a formal complaint of your failure to provide the requested information within the statutory time period?

Yours sincerely,

Peter C. Bell

FOI, Transport for London

3 Attachments

Dear Peter C. Bell,

Our ref: FOI-3624-2324

Thank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on 10 January 2024 asking for EOPS and Workshop documents.

Your request has been considered under the requirements of the Environmental Information Regulations (EIRs) and our information access policy. I can confirm that we do hold the information you require.

Please see the requested documents attached. Note, this an old workshop presentation but there has been no update made as the principles still apply. However, the business rules set out in EOPS 2013 are out-of-date and are no longer in use. Please refer to the response to your previous request [FOI-3239-2324] to view the current set of business rules.

If you are not satisfied with this response please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal.

Yours sincerely,

Tahsin Prima
FOI Case Officer
General Counsel
Transport for London

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Dear FOI,

Thank you for this information in response to my request made on 11 December 2023.

I note that earlier today my request was so complex as to require an additional 20 days before you would be able to provide the information requested.

But on challenge the information was provided within only hours of the challenge.

I will therefore pursue with the Information Commissioners Office whether there is a clear example here of an authority deliberately withholding relevant information for specious reasons.

Expect to hear from me shortly regarding this aspect of the way in which this request has been handled.

Yours sincerely,

Peter C. Bell

FOI, Transport for London

Dear Mr Bell,

 

To confirm, it was considered that since the road user charging schemes
for which your request relates exist either for the purposes of ensuring
we are maximising the ability of traffic to move along the TfL Road
Network in accordance with our duty under the Traffic Management Act 2004
or for policies designed to reduce emissions and therefore improve air
quality within London this request would fall under the EIRs More
specifically, we consider that the information sits under Regulation
2(1)(c) as the information requested relates to measures and policies
designed to reduce emissions and ensure the smooth operation of London’s
road network, rather than being information specifically about emissions.

 

Regulation 2(1)(c) - measures (including administrative measures), such as
policies, legislation, plans, programmes, environmental agreements, and
activities affecting or likely to affect the elements and factors referred
to in (a) and (b) as well as measures or activities designed to protect
those elements

 

Consideration of which legislation information should be applicable was
also guided by the following decision notices, where it was similarly
concluded that the EIRs were applicable:

[1]https://ico.org.uk/media/action-weve-tak...

[2]https://ico.org.uk/media/action-weve-tak...

 

Some complexity in processing your request arose because of its unorthodox
nature, namely that your request asked for information that was attached
to a request submitted by another requester, rather than directly for a
document or report held by TfL. This meant that it was necessary to locate
the information requested and then match it up with our own information
held internally and cross reference the data contained to authenticate the
information in order to fully consider its suitability for disclosure.
There was then a necessity to review and consider some of the content
against one or more of the applicable exceptions under the EIRs to ensure
that we could be satisfied the information was suitable for public
disclosure without redaction. As you are aware, the information related to
discretion applied when considering appeals and it was therefore necessary
to consider, in depth, whether this information could be exploited by
someone with intent to circumvent the relevant enforcement processes.
Whilst it was considered that this was a possibility, a conclusion was
reached that the public interest was in favour of disclosure and so a
decision was made to issue the response in full, which I understand you
have now received.

 

For the avoidance of doubt, the additional twenty days cited to you in the
notice of extension was a legislative deadline and not indicative of the
date you would receive a response. As you might expect, our intention is
to respond to all of the requests we receive as promptly as possible, in
line with good practice, and we routinely issue responses ahead of the
stated deadline date. It was never the case that our expectation was that
we would need the full 20 working days allowable under the legislation.
The response was therefore issued once we had resolved the matters of
consideration necessary to complete your request and the response would
have been issued at the same time irrespective of your email, as noted in
the extension letter which stated “We are working hard to ensure that you
receive a response before this date”.

 

I trust that this provides sufficient explanation of the processes
followed in the handling of your request.

Yours sincerely

Lee Hill
Information Access Manager

 

 

 

 

 

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