29.03.07 Look
out for updates on this subject
Plans to introduce tight curbs on the use of the UK’s
“freedom of information” law were today postponed.
Ministers had planned to bring in the restrictions on the freedom of
information act (FOIA) next month. However, the department for constitutional
affairs, which oversees FOIA in the UK, announced a further period of consultation
on its proposals.
The government was proposing to make it easier for public bodies to
refuse a FOIA request by claiming that it is too onerous, and to allow them
to “aggregate” requests from any one party so that the maximum
limit applies to the estimated cost of complying with all requests that it
makes to a single authority within a 60-working-day period.
The department, which is based
at Millbank, carried out a three-month consultation
exercise on its proposed amendments to the FOIA fees regulations, which closed
earlier this month. The consultation was confined to narrow questions about
the proposals.
Today, the department announced that it was issuing a supplementary
consultation paper seeking further comments by June 21 on the principle behind
the planned changes and seeking suggestions on other way of curbing “disproportionately
burdensome” FOIA requests.
Alan Beith, Liberal Democrat MP for Berwick-upon-Tweed, chairman of
the parliamentary constit-utional affairs committee, which is examining the
plans, said: “There is very serious concern about the impact of these
proposals on the working of the freedom of information act.”
“I welcome the fact that there is further consider-ation of the
principle of making these changes. The committee will report on the proposals
before the end of the consultation period.”
The delay in introducing the changes to the FOIA fees regulations has
already sparked speculation that the department may – in line with calls
by the FOIA Centre, the National Union of Journalists and newspapers –
abandon the proposals.
However, the department has only indicated that it is prepared to consider
comments on wider issues than those covered in its original consultation exercise,
and that it will take longer to reach a decision on the proposals.
It says that it may take until September to publish a summary of responses,
meaning that the decision could be delayed at least until then.
In its supplementary paper, the department says: “There have
been over 200 responses to the consultation exercise… with a wide range
of comments received. The responses to the consultation exercise will be published
along with any responses to this paper in due course. Some of the responses
received have commented on the principle of making these changes, and other
responses have stated they would have welcomed an opportunity to comment on
the principle of the changes, or have suggested that there may be better ways
of tackling those cases that create a disproportionate burden on public authorities.
“The government wishes to make clear that it is keen to hear
all those views, and it has therefore decided to issue this supplementary
paper extending the original consultation.”
It invites responses on specific points and “any other general
comments on the principle of making changes to the existing regulations or
ways of tackling the problems identified.”
FOIA
Centre commentary
The government’s announcement to consider wider issues than it originally
planned is very welcome.
On March 5, in our assessment
on the proposed FOIA changes, we said: “The department for constitutional
affairs is carrying out a ‘consultation’ exercise on its proposals,
with the deadline for submissions expiring on March 8. However, the consultation
is a sham. It has invited responses to highly restrictive questions, and even
fails to invite responses on all the changes proposed.
“Beyond the narrow scope of the consultation, the changes are
proposed on a false assumption, namely the need to curb the allegedly excessive
cost of FOIA to public bodies.”
We made the same point to the department in our submission to its original
consultation exercise. We were not, it seems, alone in making this observation.
The department has, rightly, accepted implicitly that the consultation exercise
was inadequate and, consequently, is seeking comments on wider issues raised
by the proposals.
We hope that it also comes to accept that the proposals should, as
we and many others have said, be abandoned. Some commentators are already
speculating that the department will scrap them. This is premature, wishful
thinking. And no one should forget, as perhaps ministers are pleased that
many seem to have done, that FOIA needs urgent reform to make it more effective
for the public.
Some commentators have gone further and are already referring to the
government “back-tracking” on the plans. This is an immature assessment.
Should the government be persuaded that its proposals ought to be abandoned,
either largely or in their entirety, this would be no time for name-calling
about “ministers performing U-turns” and the like.
Our first criticism of the department over its proposed FOIA changes,
one that was picked up by others, was its failure to consult properly. If
it surprises us all by actually listening and heeding this and other criticisms
of its plans, we should be as quick to welcome such a move as we were to condemn
its truly anti-democratic proposed amendments.
This is a government of contradictions. On the one hand, it introduced
into statute in the UK a long overdue freedom of information act. On the other,
a little while later, it attempts to kill off a law that had been a force,
albeit a limited one, for greater accountability.
The government’s first instincts for FOIA were right, a hang-over,
no doubt, from Labour’s long years in opposition. Its later bent towards
secrecy was wrong, a result, no doubt, of Labour’s decade in power.
Should the government overcome its flirtation with the apparently alluring
idea of strangling FOIA, then, far from ridiculous talk of “back-tracking”
and “U-turns”, we would welcome its consistency with its original
intentions.
Comment on this article
Heather
Brooke: politicians must embrace FOIA
Tim Gopsill: curbing FOIA
is bad for democracy
Why
ministers’ attempt to foil FOIA needs to fail
Government
set to break promise to MPs on FOIA
Ministers consider changing
FOIA charges regime
MPs: FOIA regulator must
become more ‘assertive’
Ministers
deny plans to increase FOIA charges
Headlines
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
 |
|
|||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
||
 |
 |
 |
|
||||||
 |
 |
|
|||||||
 |
|
||||||||
 |
|
||||||||
 |
|
||||||||
 |
|
||||||||
 |
|
||||||||
 |
|
||||||||
 |
|
||||||||
 |
|
||||||||