Sent on behalf of Dr Ken Thomson

Dear Mr Gallacher

Freedom of Information Request

I am writing to acknowledge receipt of your Freedom of Information request which we received on 19 June 2020.

Our response will be sent within 20 working days.

Yours sincerely

Dr Ken Thomson
Principal

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Dear Mr Gallacher,

Thank you for your request under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act
2002. Please find below responses to your specific queries:

1.  Under Freedom of Information Scotland, I wish to receive the following
information within 20 working days:

2.  Since lockdown until 19 June 2020, can you please provide details of
the number of staff who have accessed the college buildings or otherwise
travelled on college business?  Can you please break this down into dates,
roles, FTE numbers, duration in hours/minutes, reason for attendance and
also indicate whether this was on a voluntary basis  or for reasons
connected with their substantive roles?  

Please see attached for this information. I would like to highlight that
all information has been included and, where there are blank entries, this
is due to the staff member not providing the information - for example not
recording an exit time for their visit to the campus which means we are
unable to provide the duration information you requested for some staff
members.

The “reason for attendance” information in the attached is taken straight
from the sign-in information staff provided when visiting the site. Based
on this information and with an understanding of those roles such as
estates or facilities staff who continued to attend College to perform
tasks that were not possible to do remotely, we have indicated wherever
possible if we feel the staff members time on the campus related to their
substantive role. I would like to stress, even for those staff members
such as our facilities assistants who attended the campus to fulfil their
roles, we sought to manage risk by having limited numbers on site during
the lockdown period and particularly at the start of lockdown. We would
also not have expected a staff member to attend the campus if they were
shielding or significantly concerned.

We would judge staff who accessed the campus to pick up equipment to
support home working as not being connected to their substantive role.

3.  Please advise whether there was prior consultation with Trade Unions
before staff entered the building or travelled on college business?  If
not, please indicate your reasons. The college developed a risk
assessment for accessing the campus during lockdown and this was shared
with union reps

4.  Were Trade Unions involved in the drafting/agreement of risk
assessments prior to staff accessing the buildings and did staff have
sight of these prior to entry? Please see above. Staff attending the
building were not specifically shown this risk assessment however,
generally risk assessments for the campus are not routinely highlighted to
staff upon entry.

5.  Did any staff members have to travel more than five miles in order to
attend work under these circumstances?  If so, how many? Please see
attached for this information

6.  Did any staff have to use public transport to attend work under these
circumstances?  If so, how many? The College does not have this
information so I must inform you under section 17(1)(b) of the Act that
this information is not held.

7.  Was the decision to have staff attend work equality impact assessed?
If not, why not? No. as referred to above, if there were health and safety
concerns from the staff member on behalf of themselves or a family/care
responsibility they may have the College would not have expected them to
work on campus. Beyond this, all general equality impact assessments for
the buildings remained the same.

If you are not satisfied with the way in which your request has been dealt
with you are entitled, in the first instance, to request a review. Should
you wish to request such a review, please write to myself within 40
working days of the date of this email.

If you are not satisfied with the way in which your review has been dealt
with you are entitled to apply to the Scottish Information Commissioner
for a decision. Their contact details are: Office of the Scottish
Information Commissioner, Kinburn Castle, Doubledykes Road, St Andrews,
Fife, KY16 9DS. Telephone 01334 464610.
[1]www.itspublicknowledge.info/Appeal

Yours sincerely

Dr Ken Thomson OBE

Principal

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