Archive for October, 2005

New Secret Squirrel items

Sunday, October 30th, 2005

I’ve added two new additions to the Secret Squirrel pages:

1. A request to the Department for Constitutional Affairs for their Statute Law Database.

2. A request to the House of Commons asking for the number of attacks on MPs’ staff. This followed up my earlier request for the names of MPs’ staff. One of the excuses given for not releasing the names of MPs’ staff was that such disclosure ‘may render them, and the Members for whom they work, vulnerable to attack.’ The Commons FOI officer also stated that the Register of Interests covering Members’ secretaries and research assistants has been withdrawn from the Parliamentary website due to ‘security concerns’.

One would hope that such drastic and undemocratic measures are underpinned with some kind of empirical evidence. Apparently not, as the answer to my request shows the number of attacks recorded on MPs staff is precisely ZERO.

http://www.yrtk.org/secret-squirrel/hc_attacks

Tags:
Posted in Politics | No Comments »

Society of Editors Conference

Monday, October 24th, 2005

I attended the Society of Editors Conference October 16-18 in the Lake District and took part in a session entitled Freedom of Information – is it working?. Joining me on the panel were Graham Smith, Deputy Information Commissioner; Maurice Frankel, Director of the Campaign for Freedom of Information and Keith Mathieson, solicitor at the law firm Reynolds Porter Chamberlain.

Graham Smith told the audience his office is receiving 50 complaints a week with a total of 2,000 received so far. He rightly predicted criticism about the delay, lack of decisions and dearth of data coming out of the Commissioner’s Office. Instead of taking responsibility for these failures, Smith trotted out the usual excuses, ‘we’re on a learning curve’, ‘we’ve never had to do this before’, and best of all ‘ the public are giving us muddled documents.’

The fact is the Freedom of Information Act was passed more than five years ago after almost all other industrialised countries. This is not a new law, it is not a progressive law and five years is more than enough time to prepare for it. When the USA introduced sweeping changes to its FOI law after Watergate in 1974, agencies had just three months to change. The UK government commissioned numerous (and expensive) studies on FOI in the years leading up to 1 January 2005, which predicted exactly the types and number of cases that would be appealed to the Commissioner.

It is cheap and cowardly to blame the public for these delays. A more likely culprit is foot-dragging from public authorities, particularly central government. But where is the criticism of say, the Cabinet Office? Oh no – the Commissioner isn’t going to pick on the big guys, just the little ‘woman in the street’.

After nine months, there is simply no excuse for a 1,500 case backlog and just three decisions actually ordering disclosure. At the conference, many editors talked of their frustration that the Commissioner wasn’t even posting a list of the cases he is investigating. I told the conference that I had to make an FOIA request just to get this information in August. When I asked the ICO to make this data available they said it was ‘not in the public interest’. All the editors had a good laugh about this, prompting Smith to promise that ‘we’ll look into doing that’.

Another complaint was about the time taken to rule on cases. I have repeatedly asked the ICO for a commitment on the time taken to get through cases. They have always refused to set a time limit, but when pressed to do so at the conference, Smith said the Office was working to a minimum target of resolving 50 percent of cases within 12 working weeks. But until the caseload database is published, there is no way of knowing if this most basic target is being met.

Leadership is about taking responsibility and this is precisely what the ICO is not doing. In my own cases, there was no muddling of paperwork and yet a complaint filed at the beginning of April was only just handed to an investigator last week! Two complaints made in February are still awaiting a decision. I am preparing a longer piece about the problems at the ICO’s office for several publications so watch this space, and please email or post comments telling me of your own experiences.

Posted in Freedom of Information | No Comments »

FOI in Parliament 13-21 October

Monday, October 24th, 2005

21 October 2005
Written Answers – Deputy Prime Minister: Regional Housing Boards
To ask the Deputy Prime Minister whether the regional housing boards will be subject to the Freedom of Information Act 2000 when they are merged with the regional chambers.
Yvette Cooper: …Regional Assemblies are voluntary bodies and not therefore subject to the *Freedom of Information* Act 2000. However, “Guidance on the General Principles of Designation of Voluntary Regional Assemblies”, issued by my Department in October 2004 states: “The Assembly should…

20 Oct 2005
Business of the House
David Chaytor: …has opened up the debate on Trident, is it not essential that we do not allow Conservative interpretations of what constitutes national security or commercial confidentiality to limit the spirit of *freedom of information* about Trident in which the debate must take place?

19 October 2005
Written Answers – Deputy Prime Minister: Departmental Websites
Jim Fitzpatrick: …answer given on 17 October 2005, Official Report, column 806W. Unique visitors to the ODPM website have more than doubled since its launch. The website also helps ODPM to fulfil its commitment to *Freedom of Information*, with more than 300 publications and nearly 300 press releases and statements uploaded to the website in 2004–05. ODPM is therefore continuing to develop the…

Written Answers – Northern Ireland: Freedom of Information
Angela Smith: It is not possible to identify precisely the number of officials who deal with *freedom of information* issues, since it is potentially part of every civil servant’s role to respond to *Freedom of Information* requests. However, one of the primary support functions of Information Management staff is to deal with these requests, plus requests made under the Data Protection Act 1998 and the…

18 October 2005
Identity Cards Bill (Programme) (No. 3)
William Cash: …to an enabling Bill. The enabling process changes the nature of the operation completely and will not allow proper debate. As the Minister well knows, the reality is that in the context of what the *Information Commissioner* said, this is about state surveillance. That is why I presented George Orwell’s book “1984″ to the Home Secretary who, to his disgrace, is not here this afternoon…

14 October 2005
Police Cautions (Data Protection)
Paul Goggins: … To obtain greater clarity on the operation of the Data Protection Act 1998 in such a case, Hertfordshire police decided to approach the *Information Commissioner*, who referred the police to Home Office circulars 20/1988 and 55/1998…The Data Protection Act 1998 should not be seen as a barrier to disclosure. It permits disclosures where they are required for legitimate purposes, but does not permit those which would be an unwarranted invasion of privacy. The Act is complex and requires careful judgements to be made, but the starting point should always be to look for reasons to enable information to be shared rather than blocked.

13 October 2005
Written Answers – Constitutional Affairs: Freedom of Information Act
Oliver Heald (North East Hertfordshire, Con) : To ask the Minister of State, Department for Constitutional Affairs what assessment she has made of improvements achieved by the Freedom of Information Act 2000 over the former Code of Practice on access to Government information.

Posted in Freedom of Information | No Comments »

Let them read Heat

Thursday, October 13th, 2005

Has anybody in Britain actually read ’1984′
The Independent, 13 October 2005
By Heather Brooke

“There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. How often, or on what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual wire was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time.” George Orwell, 1984

It seems appropriate that the author of ‘1984’ was a British citizen. George Orwell must have seen how easily the great British public’s lamb-like disposition toward its leaders could be exploited to create a police state.

Say what you will about Americans, but one thing they are not is passive. The Bush administration may have pushed through the Patriot Act weeks after September 11th, but as the American public got to grips with how the law was affecting their individual rights, their protests grew loud and angry.

Yesterday saw the publication of the Government’s latest Anti-Terror Bill that would give police even more power. The House of Lords, meanwhile, is debating the Racial and Religious Hatred Bill and Whitehall is investigating ways to ban former civil servants from publishing their accounts of what happens inside the corridors of power.

There are already nearly 200 pieces of anti-terrorism legislation. What else can be left except thought-crime? The police and politicians have scented power and they want to run it to ground. Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair shamelessly demands more laws even while his department is under investigation for shooting dead an innocent Brazilian and covering up the extent of the botched operation

But never underestimate the British public’s lack of interest in serious issues. They may moan and gripe but the most they are likely to do is write a letter to the editor ‘Yours outraged, Tunbridge Wells’. Soon enough they will be back gobbling up their junk diet of celebrity piffle. One can almost here the powers-that-be issuing their proclamation to the masses: ‘Let them read Heat.’
(more…)

Tags:
Posted in Articles | 2 Comments »

Shortlisted for campaigning journalism award

Sunday, October 9th, 2005

I have been shortlisted for the inaugural Paul Foot Award for campaigning journalism. The award was set up by Private Eye magazine, The Guardian and the National Union of Journalists in memory of journalist Paul Foot who died earlier this year.

The judges said:

“The cornerstone of Paul’s journalism was the public’s right to know what their leaders were doing in their name. He took the view we probably wouldn’t like it if we knew and that is why they lied and covered-up when they could. In a raft of investigations, Heather Brooke has campaigned tirelessly to strip away the secrecy our rulers would impose if we let them. But for the tenacity and breadth of knowledge of such journalists as Heather, they would probably succeed.”

There were more than 100 entries from many distinguished writers, so I am thrilled to have made it to the final six.

The other shortlisted candidates are John Sweeney (Daily Mail), the Bristolian magazine, Felicity Lawrence (The Guardian), Daniel Foggo and Charlotte Edwardes (Sunday Telegraph), and Eamonn O’Neill (The Herald, Glasgow).

The winner will be announced Tuesday 11 October 2005 at Simpson’s-in-the-Strand, London. Top prize is £5000 with £1000 to each of the runners-up.

Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments »

Information Commissioner: Delay and Indecision

Wednesday, October 5th, 2005

I have uploaded the caseload database from the Information Commissioner’s Office, which I received 4 August 2005.

It was quite a long process getting this database. Originally, in response to my 1 June 2005 FOIA request for ‘all complaints’ I was given a database containing just 375 entries. I knew from attending conferences that the Information Commissioner’s Office was already up to 1,000 complaints when I made my request, so I telephoned and discovered they had misinterpreted in an overly restrictive way. They agreed to send me the outstanding information in electronic form.

I admit I could have got the data up here a bit sooner, but why is it up to me to do this? The Commissioner’s Office should:
a) have this data online at all times and accessibly to the public.
b) if they didn’t have it before they at least had the data they gave me – why didn’t they publish it on their own website?

Many of the cases on the database are from February and March 2005. Anything from this time period is definitely overdue and it’s worth pointing out that the Scottish Information Commissioner has a policy of closing all investigations within four months.

It’s particularly noticeable that most of these decisions are being made not against the big government departments, but against small authorities. Where decisions have been made, evidence is mounting that far from ushering in a new era of openness, the Commissioner is protecting the secrecy status quo.

Delay is not the only sign the Information Commissioner is letting down the public. The Commissioner is failing to make decisions. Only two orders for disclosure have been made so far and both were against local councils, not central government. One, Bridgnorth District Council in Shropshire, was ordered to release council files in a land dispute. The other, Corby Borough Council, was told to give a complainant details of how much was paid to a temporarily employed finance officer.

In all other cases, ranging from a list of the revenue generated by speed cameras to information about how council tax bands are calculated, the Information Commissioner has sided with the public authority, or simply declared that a refusal notice had not been properly issued.

Strictly speaking, complaints against 23 authorities have been upheld, but the majority of these are cases in which the commissioner has ruled that the refusal to release information was not issued according to the letter of the law or the council has misinterpreted the request being made of it.

Some decisions have highlighted the impotence of the Commissioner. One district council, for example, ignored a citizen who asked for information and then went on to ignore the Commissioner, too, when he tried to investigate the case. Westminster City Council incorrectly told a citizen that the FOI Act did not cover the maintenance of pavements by the council.

The Commissioner did not order this information released, but instead could only order that the council consider the request under the new law and if they refuse the request, to do so in the proper legal format.

Where a complainant’s account differs with that of a public authority, the Commissioner seems to give the benefit of the doubt to the public authority. For instance, he accepted that the Human Fertilisation & Embryology Authority “complied with the Act in posting a response to the complainant within 20 days, even though the complainant stated such a letter was never received”.

A decision against the Cabinet Office after it failed to respond within the 20 working days was upheld, but “as the Cabinet Office subsequently did respond, the Decision Notice did not identify any steps to be taken”. In other words, nothing was done about what was a purely technical breach of the act’s wording.

It is not clear if the Cabinet Office’s “response” was to grant the request (for information about emails sent by and to Andrew Adonis, now Lord Adonis), or as seems more likely, to refuse it.

Posted in Politics | 2 Comments »