Freedom of Information

I noticed the other day that my original Freedom of Information (FOI) appeal about the pay of traditional male jobs in South Lanarkshire Council - was upheld by the Scottish Information Commissioner in September 2011.

And then it took several more months for the Court of Session to hear South Lanarkshire's appeal - before three senior Scottish judges gave the council shirt shrift as well.

I can hardly wait until the 8th July 2013 - when the case is due to be called in the UK Supreme Court - but I stand by my view that this is a cynical abuse of the FOI process.

No Contest (2 April 2012)

Here are some more extracts from the Court of Session judgment - which threw out South Lanarkshire Council's appeal to overturn an adjudicated decision by the Scottish Information Commissioner.

[1] This is an Appeal at the instance of South Lanarkshire Council against a decision of the Scottish Information Commissioner under Section 56 of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002.

[2] The requested information concerned the basic hourly rate of pay for the Appellant’s job category, “Land Service Operative 3” (“LSO 3”).

The Requester, Mr Irvine, wanted to know how many of the total number of LSO 3 posts were placed at Spinal Column Points 25-34 respectively. Although the precise nature of this information was explained to us, it did not in the end prove relevant to a resolution of the legal issues involved.

What is relevant is that the Appellant declined to divulge the information in question and it appears from the papers that their principal concern was the possibility that individual employees might be identifiable if the information were released.

In the result, however, the Commissioner, who was the only compearing Respondent in the Appeal, found, as matter of fact, that that apprehension was unfounded and the Appellant makes no challenge to the validity of that finding.

So what this means is that South Lanarkshire Council made a big fuss about nothing - when it complained originally about the possibility of personal details being made public.

In other words, this was a complete red herring - a diversion, a smokescreen - call it what you will.

But as it has taken many months and even years - and huge sums of public money for the council finally to be called to account.

I call it a cynical abuse of the freedom of information process.