Dear Sir or Madam,

Thank you for publishing your spend data here: https://www.walsallhealthcare.nhs.uk/abo...
However, I notice that you haven't published any spending data in machine readable form since September.

We understand that due to the COVID-19 pandemic it may not have been a priority to publish your spending data. However, we strongly believe that the spending data is critical to understanding how Government functions and this data is vital for our work. We would be extremely grateful if you could update this information as soon as reasonably possible.

I'd like to make a request under the Freedom of Information act for all transactions over £25,000 from October to at most a month in arrears from the date at which you publish in response to this request.

Please provide the data in a machine readable format (preferably csv). As a minimum, please make sure to include the date, value and recipient of each transaction. Please also provide details on the procurement category of each transaction if you have it.

Your team may also be interested in the guidance on producing spending data:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publicatio.... This letter makes it clear that this guidance applies to the NHS: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/sy....

For the avoidance of doubt, I am making this request under the Freedom of Information Act. I await your response within 20 working days.

Yours Faithfully,

Zsofia Molnar

Spend Network

Dear Rachel Murphy,

Thank you very much for your kind reply. In the meantime would it be possible that you send the October and December 2022 files in machine readable format (ie.: .CSV), please? Unfortunately those months are available just in PDF on your website. January and February 2023 would be great to get as well. Thank you very much in advance!

Yours sincerely,
Zsofia Molnar
Spend Network

Dear Rachel Murphy,

Would you be so kind to send an update on the FOI request FOI ref: 648.22-23, please? On your website the October and December data of 2022 are still in just PDF format - the official publishing format is .CSV. Could you send the data in machine readable format, please?

In the meantime could you send the data from January to March 2023 as well, please? Thank you very much in advance!

Yours sincerely,
Zsofia Molnar
Spend Network

Dear Sir or Madam,

On 20th March, I sent you a FOI request for your expenditure over £25,000 from October to present. It was allocated the reference 648.22 23.

On 29th March, you refused my request citing Section 21 of the FOI Act as grounds for an exemption. In the meantime the data is still just in PDF, not in machine readable format.

However, the guidance for publishing spend data for government departments states:
2.10 Spend is to be published one month in arrears, ie by the last working day of the month following the month to which the data relates. If the data is available before the end of the month, it should be published as soon as the department has cleared it for release. This data is to be published in individual monthly files.
2.11 You should not hold up the publication of your data where you have unresolved individual queries. You should publish the cleared data within the publication timescales, and amend the data at a later date if necessary. See section 2.5 for further detail on applying redactions to the data.

Please see here for more details: https://www.gov.uk/government/publicatio.... This letter makes it clear that this guidance applies to the NHS: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/sy....

This means that the data requested should already be published. For this reason, I would like to request an Internal Review of the initial response to my Freedom of Information request.

Please also take note of this decision notice from the ICO on the use of Section 22 of the FOI Act in these circumstances: https://ico.org.uk/media/action-weve-tak...

I await your response within 20 working days.

Yours Faithfully,

Zsofia Molnar

Spend Network

Dear Liam Jackson,

Thank you very much for your kind reply and for your cooperation! Almost all the data now has been published, thank you for that. In the meantime October and December 2022 data are still in PDF format, January 2023 is missing entirely. Could you send those files in .CSV format, please?
Thank you very much in advance!

Yours sincerely,
Zsofia Molnar
Spend Network

Dear Liam Jackson,

Thank you very much for the detailed answer. In the meantime the data of October and December 2022 are still just on PDF on the website. Would it be possible to send that data to us in machine readable format (.CSV), please?

Thank you very much in advance!
Yours sincerely,
Zsofia Molnar
Spend Network