Use of automated decision-making and automated decision support tools
Dear Causeway Coast and Glens Borough Council,
I am writing under the Freedom of Information Act 2000, to make a request for information relating to your organisation’s use of automated decision making and automated decision support tools and systems (ADM tools).
For the purposes of this request, an automated decision is one in which an automated system performs at least part of the decision-making process, including:
- Decision support: where an automated system provides additional information to aid a human decision-maker in their decisions (e.g. a system assesses whether someone poses a risk of housing benefit fraud, and presents that risk score to a decision maker to inform their decision)),
- Streaming or triage: where an automated system determines the type and quality of human judgment involved in a particular case (e.g. a system deems an individual’s application to present a high risk of housing benefit fraud, which means the application is directed to a particular team to review)
- Fully automated: where an automated system takes a decision and action in relation to a person or group without human input (e.g. a system automatically assesses and approves an application)
Automation refers to any form of automation including. but not limited to, data matching, profiling, machine learning or any other tools that use software algorithms to generate outputs.
Examples of ADM usage could include, for example, risk assessments in adult social care or social housing decisions.
Please provide the following:
1. Copies of any inventory that the authority has of tools, artificial intelligence or software algorithms used to assist in decision-making.
2. If not included in the above, the names of any such tools.
3. Where a process contains ADM or is partially supported by automated tools, any Equality Impact Assessments that have been carried out.
4. Where a process contains ADM or is partially supported by automated tools, any Data Protection Impact Assessments that have been carried out.
Yours faithfully,
Caroline Selman
Dear Sir / Madam,
REQUEST FOR ACCESS TO INFORMATION
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000
With reference to your request for information held by Causeway Coast and
Glens Borough Council located in Northern Ireland under the above
legislation.
Response:
The Council has undertaken a search of its records and failed to locate
any relevant records to your request based on the information you have
provided. Accordingly Council can confirm that it does not hold the
information to which you seek access.
Under Section 16 of the Freedom of Information Act which places a duty on
public authorities “to provide advice and assistance” we would advise you
that this is because local authorities in Northern Ireland do not have
legislative responsibility for this area of responsibility. Local
authorities are not responsible for the following functions: Education,
personal social services, health, roads, public housing, fire service,
police service, trading standards, drainage water, sewerage, libraries,
street lighting, collection of rates, transport, community safety, urban
regeneration.
See: [1]https://www.nidirect.gov.uk/articles/loc...
The Department for Communities offer some financial support services, see
[2]https://www.communities-ni.gov.uk/dfc-su...
For further guidance on the [3]role of local authorities within Northern
Ireland and other statutory partners please refer to Northern Ireland’s
one stop government portal: [4]NIDirect.
If you have any queries in relation to your request for access to
information, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Individuals are free to use any information supplied, where the Council is
the copyright owner of the information, for their own use, including for
non-commercial research purposes. The information may also be used for the
purposes of news reporting. However, any other type of re-use, such as:
copying, publishing, distributing and transmitting the Information;
adapting the Information; exploiting the Information commercially for
example, by combining it with other Information, or by including it in
your own commercial product or application, will be subject to the
copyright and re-use conditions under the Open Government Licence.
If you are dissatisfied with how the Council handled your request for
information, you have the right to request that the Council formally
review this decision. If you wish to do so, please write within 40
working days to the:
Chief Executive
Causeway Coast and Glens Borough Council
Cloonavin
66 Portstewart Road
Coleraine, BT52 1EY.
Should you remain dissatisfied following the Council’s internal review,
you can seek an independent review from the Information Commission. A
request for an independent review should be made in writing to:
Information Commissioner at ICO, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow,
Cheshire, SK9 5AF. The Commissioner has indicated that a review will not
be undertaken unless the Council has first had an opportunity to
reconsider its decision.
Please be advised that under the Freedom of Information Act, replies
including the request may be released into the public domain via our
website [5]www.causewaycoastandglens.gov.uk. Personal details in respect
of your request will, where applicable, be removed to protect
confidentiality.
Council will process your personal data, provided as part of this request
i.e. name and contact details as part of its legal obligation. For
further information regarding your privacy rights or for how long we hold
your data, please refer to the privacy section of the website:
[6]www.causewaycoastandglens.gov.uk/footer-information/privacy-statement.
Yours sincerely,
Aileen Devlin
Business Support Assistant
Policy and Community Planning
[7][email address]
[8]Causeway Coast and Glens Borough Council
[9]www.causewaycoastandglens.gov.uk
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