First FOI ruling in Scotland

Thursday, 2 June 2005, 18:51

The first ruling on the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act has been published by the Scottish Information Commissioner.

The Lothian and Borders Safety Camera Partnership was repremanded for breaching the Act when it refused to hand over to a motorist the calibration certificate for a speed camera. The authority failed to inform the citizen making the request why they were refusing.

The UK Information Commissioner has apparently already made a number of decisions (six, I’m told) under the UK Freedom of Information Act but (ironically) none of them have been published yet:

OUT-LAW contacted the UK Office today and was advised that the UK Commissioner, Richard Thomas, is still deciding, “in the light of experience with early cases, just how much detail can be made public in relation to decided cases without prejudicing the rights of all parties, in particular the right of appeal to the Information Tribunal.”

The Office added that details of its experience so far with FOI will be made public in mid-June.

That should be interesting.

Entry Filed under: Freedom of Information