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12 January 2025
This is Part 3 of a series of blogs about systems that should ensure that parish councils can be held accountable – but are failing. This part is about the Information Commissioner’s Office (the ICO) which was set up by the Government to enforce the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA) and other legislation.
In order to make a parish council accountable, you need information about its decisions and activities. If you don’t know, for example, what the council is spending your money on, then how can you make it accountable for obtaining value for money. If you can’t obtain the relevant risk assessments, how can you make the parish council accountable for the health and safety of its business?
If you don’t even know when and where the parish council is meeting, and/or you can’t get hold of the supporting papers for the meetings, how can you be there and ask relevant questions or put your concerns?
The ICO understands this. It says it “exists to empower you through information”.
However, pursuing information requests via the ICO is exhausting and slow. It takes so long that the information requested is often irrelevant by the time you get it.
The ICO does not have sufficient resources to handle the volume of complaints in a timely way; at the moment, there is a four-month delay in cases being assigned, let alone being resolved.
So, the ICO is failing to empower the public and enable it to hold councils to account.
How it should work
You should be able to find much of the basic information you might need on HPC’s website.
I leave you to decide how adequate HPC’s website is.
If you want other information, HPC’s policy and procedures tell you how to get it (at Freedom-of-Information-.pdf ). The procedures comply with the FOIA and it should be very easy.
You should write to the Clerk requesting information and he should acknowledge your request within 2 working days.
The Clerk should then do one of three things within 20 working days (and preferably sooner): -
1. Tell you that the Council holds the information and provide it; or
2. Tell you that the Council holds the information but has decided not to provide it. In this case, the Council must provide you with an explanation for withholding the information and tell you under what exemption of the FOIA it is withholding the information; or
3. Tell you it does not hold the information you requested.
If you are dissatisfied, you can ask the Clerk for an internal review of the response.
This review is carried out by councillors and should take no more than 20 working days or 40 days if the request is complex.
If you are dissatisfied with the review, you can complain to the ICO.
Simple, isn’t it?
Normally, councillors don’t have to use the Freedom of Information Act to get information about the council. It is the Clerk’s responsibility to produce the information required by councillors for making decisions; if asked for information by councillors, the Clerk would simply provide it.
Unfortunately, this is HPC
Many of my requests for information since Mr. Truppin became HPC’s locum Clerk in November 2023 have been ignored. This has led, on a number of occasions, to me voting against Council resolutions on the basis that I had insufficient information to make a well- informed decision.
On 3 occasions during the past year, I decided to complain to the ICO because Mr. Truppin had either declined to provide the information or not responded. If the ICO process wasn’t so slow, I would have used it more. But life is too short.
The details of the 3 cases are below. I expect you will just skim but the cases show how the ICO fails “to empower through information”.
These cases also show that HPC has absolutely no commitment to its own policy on requesting information which says: -
“We are required by the law to provide information. However, we believe that providing information to the public – and answering questions - is not just about complying with the law; it is also about engaging with residents and encouraging them to participate and help us with our business.
We are committed to acting and taking decisions in an open and transparent manner. This is one of the principles of public life. These principles are the basis of the ethical standards expected of public office holders.
We are also committed to being accountable to the public for our decisions and actions, another principle of public life. So if you ask us to explain ourselves, we need to give you an explanation.”
Far from being “open and transparent”, the 3 cases show that HPC is obstructive, secretive, unprofessional and doesn’t care if it breaks the law.
For each of the 3 cases, the ICO issued a legal enforcement notice, called a Decision Notice (DN), stating that HPC had breached the FOIA.
None of the DNs were notified to Council by Mr Truppin. In each case, I circulated the DNs to Council. Not one councillor responded so, as I say, it appears they don’t care.
More recently
Things haven’t improved.
On 6 December last year, I asked for a copy of a recording made by the deputy Clerk of the Finance Committee on 3 December.
The deputy Clerk responded to say that his “understanding was the recording was purely to assist in minute production, not for distribution. On that basis I can’t, however I will have to defer the decision to the clerks.”
Ms Yaseen, HPC’s new Chief Officer, then said “The recording of meetings are solely used for taking notes and not distribution.”
I referred the deputy Clerk to the ICO’s guidance i.e.: -
"You have the right to request recorded information held by public authorities. The most obvious kind of recorded information is electronic or paper copies of formal documents, like policies or minutes of meetings. But you can also request information held in other kinds of records like emails, photographs or audio recordings."
"If you ask for information, public authorities must provide it, unless there’s a good reason not to. "
The deputy Clerk then said he would respond “in due course”. The deadline under the FOIA is now well past.
I have had no response and I have asked for an internal review.
I'm taking a break for a couple of weeks but will update you on my return.
Three examples of requests referred to the ICO
1. Request for two inspection reports of HPC’s playgrounds
On 20 May 2024, I asked Mr Truppin for copies of the quarterly reports of the playgrounds carried out since January 2024.
He had previously said that I could make an appointment to read the reports in the office. I had said I did not have the time to make appointments for visits to the office nor the time to visit the office and read the reports there. Moreover, I wanted to retain the reports electronically so I could keep them for reference.
Mr. Truppin declined to provide the reports and did not specify under which exemption he had done so, as required by the FOIA.
On 4 June, I asked for an internal review.
Mr. Truppin did not respond.
On 24 June, I complained to the ICO. ICO wrote to HPC on 5 July saying HPC was required to give a substantive response by 19 July.
On 18 July, I was sent copies of the playground reports under confidential cover. The ICO did not think this was a proper response as information provided under the FOIA cannot be provided on a confidential basis.
On 1 August, the ICO issued a Decision Notice (DN) to Mr. Truppin.
It said that, based on evidence available to the Commissioner, HPC had not issued a substantive response to my request which complied with the FOIA; HPC had breached section 10 of FOIA. Failure to comply might result in the Commissioner making written certification of this fact to the High Court pursuant to section 54 of FOIA and might be dealt with as a contempt of court.
Mr. Truppin did not respond.
The ICO gave two final warnings with two more deadlines.
Mr. Truppin did not respond.
On 30 October, the ICO wrote to Mr. Tuppin saying that if the DN was not complied with within 7 calendar days, the file would be passed to the Commissioner's solicitors with a view to commencing proceedings.
Mr. Truppin did not respond.
Finally, on 26 November, I received the reports from the deputy Clerk, he said on the instructions of the ICO. I thanked the ICO for their help.
So it took 5 months to get the inspection reports. This was due to Mr. Truppin’s repeated failure to carry out his responsibility as Clerk to comply with the FOIA. This failure led to HPC breaching the FOIA as a matter of public record. HPC was within 7 days of the ICO starting legal proceeding against HPC in the High Court.
2. Request for information about staff
On 5 January 2024, I asked Mr. Truppin for some basic information about Council employees (e.g. their names and when they were appointed by Council) and about people carrying out contracted administrative services (e.g. their names and the date on which they were contracted).
Mr. Truppin did not respond.
On 24 February, I asked for an internal review.
Mr. Truppin did not respond.
I then had to wait 40 days before the ICO’s system would allow a complaint.
On 6 June, the ICO wrote to Mr Truppin pointing out that he needed to respond.
Mr Truppin did not respond.
On 8 July, the ICO upheld my complaint and issued a DN saying HPC had breached section 10 of FOIA again and it should provide a substantive response.
Mr Truppin did not respond.
The ICO wrote to Mr Truppin again and he finally responded on 21 August 2024 saying :-
“Under GDPR we are not prepared to share private information relating to current and former employees of Hughenden Parish Council. This information is available for viewing to those appointed to the Human Resources Committee, and personal information may be redacted in line with GDPR.
"Where individuals are appointed to the Hughenden Parish Council Office outside of PAYE employment are agency staff, and not employed by Hughenden Parish Council. The agency supplying the individuals have all been approved by Council, and records held on their employment are held by them. Any contracts relating to the agency can be viewed at the Council Office.”
On 1 September, I asked for an internal review on the grounds, amongst other things, that Mr Truppin had not specified the exemption that would allow the Council to decline my request – and much of the information I requested should be in the public domain.
Mr Truppin did not respond.
On 27 October, I complained to the ICO. Under its procedures, I had had to make a new complaint – and again wait 40 days.
On 7 November, the ICO said my complaint was eligible and was awaiting a case officer. Due to a lack of staff resources, there was a four-month delay in assigning cases.
So, it has taken over a year, not to get an internal review – and it will be March before my case is assigned to a case officer.
3. Request for invoices for Council March meeting.
On 14 March 2024, I asked Mr. Truppin for copies of some invoices.
Mr Truppin did not respond.
On 11 April, I asked for an internal review.
The same day, Mr Truppin said invoices were available for inspection in a folder on the table at Council meetings.
I asked again for an internal review saying Council was required to specify the exemption under which it was refusing to provide the information.
Mr Truppin did not respond.
On 20 June, I complained to the ICO. The ICO wrote to Mr. Truppin asking him to provide a substantive response within 10 working days.
Mr Truppin did not respond.
On 17 July, the ICO issued a DN saying HPC was in breach of the FOIA, requiring it to provide a substantive response within 30 calendar days.
Mr Truppin did not respond.
The ICO issued a final warning to HPC saying failure to comply within 7 days would mean commencement of proceedings for contempt of court.
On 21 August, Mr. Truppin wrote to the ICO saying copies of the invoices were available at meetings and for viewing at Council Offices.
The same day, the ICO provided guidance to Mr Truppin on Section 43 of the FOIA.
2 hours later, Mr Truppin wrote to me citing S.43 and repeating that invoices were available at council meetings and could be viewed in the council offices.
On 27 August, I asked for an internal review of Mr Truppin’s refusal to provide me with the information in compliance with the FOIA. The ICO said HPC was required to do this within 20 working days.
On 28 August, the deputy Clerk wrote to me saying HPC proposed to extend the 20 working days to 40 days because Council had no councillors to carry out the review and needed to appoint councillors.
I pointed out that Council has been aware of the need to appoint more councillors since September 2023.
On 10 September, Council appointed Cllrs Jones and Thomas to carry out internal reviews of FOIA requests.
On 22 September, I was invited to a meeting by Cllr Kearey who said he was the Chair of the review panel. Cllr Kearey was not one of the two councillors appointed by Council to carry out internal reviews and had no authority to be on the panel, let alone chair it. The other member of the panel was Cllr Jones and they were meeting for an “FoI Hearing”.
I could not make that date but said my presence was, in any case, not necessary as the purpose of the review was to determine whether Mr’s Truppin’s handling of my request complied with the FOIA. It was his presence that was necessary, if any.
On 1 October, at HPC’s Finance Committee, I asked to see 3 invoices in a folder on the table at the meeting. I was shouted at by Cllrs Jones, Mr Wilding and Mr Truppin for delaying the meeting – and only 1 invoice I requested was found.
On 6 October, I was invited by Cllr Kearey to a meeting and told “I would be given a fair hearing.” The ICO’s guidance makes clear that people making requests are not required to justify their requests. I repeated that the purpose of the review was not to ask me to justify my request but to determine whether Mr’s Truppin’s handling of my request complied with the FOIA.
In the end, I said I would attend a meeting solely to ensure that Cllrs Jones and Kearey had all the papers. They didn’t. So I provided copies.
Cllr Jones then asked me to justify my request for the invoices and stated that it was not for HPC to carry out this review; it was for me to complain to the ICO about their guidance on S.43 of the Act if I didn’t like it.
As I hadn’t mentioned S.43 (and actually thought the guidance very helpful), I concluded that Cllr Jones didn’t understand what the panel was required to do – or didn’t want to understand.
I just left Cllrs Kearey and Jones to it.
On 15 October, I received a copy of a report, signed by Cllr Kearey.
It is absolutely no surprise that the report supported Mr. Truppin’s refusal to disclose the invoices.
What is surprising (actually amazing) is that this support is based on the panel’s belief that “the Commissioner had already found that my request had been satisfied” – and this belief is based on the ICO providing guidance on S.43 of the FOIA.
Perhaps Cllrs Jones and Kearey didn’t read the guidance. Because the guidance makes it clear that, if councils use this exemption, the onus is on the council to specify what harm the disclosure of the information would cause and demonstrate a causal link.
Cllr Kearey's report provided no mention of any harm and no demonstration of a causal link. In fact, the report doesn’t even mention S. 43 of the FOIA – or indeed the FOIA itself.
Bizarrely, what the report tried to demonstrate instead was that Mr. Truppin had handled my request in compliance with HPC’s Financial Regulations.
Incidentally, it is no surprise that the report said I was interviewed by the panel, when I wasn’t. And no surprise that the panel did not interview Mr. Truppin.
On 18 October, I appealed to the ICO against the panel’s conclusions. The ICO said my appeal is eligible but – yes you have guessed it – there is a 4-month delay in my case being assigned.
So it will be February 2025 before the ICO considers my appeal about the invoices I requested in March 2024.
All I can say is that, whatever the ICO decide, the report gave me a good laugh.
For a local council you stink, as for democracy well its a great pity the electors from which ever party will not get rid of this shower