Responsibility for Health, Safety and Standards in NICS

AIDAN QUINN made this Freedom of Information request to Prime Minister's Office This request has been closed to new correspondence. Contact us if you think it should be reopened.

This request has been withdrawn by the person who made it. There may be an explanation in the correspondence below.

Dear Prime Minister’s Office,

Heads of Service in NICS are, sadly, widely known to still be totally and absolutely committed to the traditional, long-standing, and fully official written Policy of Noting and Filing all reported potential fraud, hate-crime, bias and other malpractice.

I have checked and this Policy, despite endless requests, and despite endless requests about its fundamental Safety, has never been revoked. Consequently, Whistleblowers, rather than being listened to, are instead still officially silenced in perpetuity, defamed, traduced and sacked all without right of reply.

Endless surveys show that the place consequently has some of the world’s worst levels of stress, inefficiency, disengagement, unaddressed psychiatric injury, mental ill health, dissatisfaction and distrust.
NICS would be internationally recognised as has having long failed to provide a psychiatrically safe working environment.

Forensically secure Government vaults are known to be full to the brim of unconsidered evidence. Endless requests for forensic testing of such evidence are invariably refused point blank, no reason given.

Complaints about Heads of Service are now in theory, since 2016, heard by the excellent Permanent Secretary of the Scottish Government. Nobody however knows how this system works, or if NICS co-operates, since the system has never actually been tried

My query seeks to establish the situation prior to 2016 which is when, if work related psychiatric injury statistics are anything to be by, hugely dangerous levels of malpractice appear to have occurred. A lot of people have had their health and career ruined.

Please advise if there any record of where responsibility for investigating complaints, originating prior to 2016, about Heads of Service lies? Where do injured parties take their complaints, where do they seek redress? Please advise.

Yours faithfully,

AIDAN QUINN

Dear Prime Minister’s Office,
Hi, we're a little overdue.
Do please get back to me just as soon as you feel able.
Nobody judges, traditional Ulster Note and File Only Orders challenge us all.

Yours faithfully,

AIDAN QUINN

Dear Prime Minister’s Office,

Hi, I don’t want to be thought to be criticising anybody but I think we all know that this is just taking too long. Events are overtaking us. In the circumstances, can I please ask for an Internal Review?

Good Luck,

I wish you well.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/r...

Yours faithfully,

AIDAN QUINN

Dear Prime Minister’s Office,
I do apologise if I seem to ask rather a lot of Questions but, like all who have been victims of fraud or who have otherwise suffered a loss ( such as loss of health, reputation, career or prospects), it is of course incumbent on me as the victim to do my utmost to try to mitigate the effect of such fraud or the extent of such loss.
I’m sure you understand.

As I seem to recall explaining ( maybe more than once) back in the day when I thought I was being listened to, those who have been victims of fraud have a right to expect to be restored to the position they could reasonably have expected to have enjoyed had the fraud not occurred. We all have to be mindful that the public purse is not bottomless.

Good Luck, as ever I I wish you well.

Yours faithfully,

AIDAN QUINN

Dear Prime Minister’s Office,
Hey just a quick reminder- how is the Internal Review coming along?

Good Luck. I wish you well.

Yours faithfully,

AIDAN QUINN

Dear Prime Minister’s Office,
Hi, we’re vastly overdue and seem to be getting nowhere, if you don’t mind my saying so.
It looks like we may have to jointly accept that fully Officially Endorsed, Old Style, Ulster Note and File Only Requirements are just not compatible with the requirements of modern day FOI Legislation. Files and Servers are everywhere getting hopelessly clogged and backlogged. That’s good for nobody.
Again if you don’t mind ,I’ll just quietly withdraw the Query, at least temporarily until, following the findings of Public Inquiry or whatever, NICS dedication to endless official inaction, endless official Noting and Filing Only eases even if only slightly.
At that stage, or at any earlier stage of your own choosing, the position regarding Noting and Filing can be reviewed and, hopefully, FOI backlogs cleared. Rest assured no one judges, everyone the world over recognises that conditions in NICS/NIO have long been some of the most challenging in the world.
Good Luck and keep safe. Keep your staff safe too, fulfilling your Duty of Care to them. That’s the main thing.

Yours faithfully,

AIDAN QUINN