Somerset County Council: Freedom of InformationRequest
Internal Review: Findings
SomersetDirectref: 2342653
Information requested by:Mr Tony Morris
Review carried out by:Peter Grogan (Information Governance Manager)
1. Summary of process
- Request received: 13 February 2013
- Response sent: 26 April 2013
- Review requested:11 May 2013
2. Review of Response
In your email toPeter Grogan (Information Governance Manager)dated 11th May 2013, you requested an Internal Review and raised the following issues:
- The response exceeded the statutory timeframes, please explain why?
- Please provide high level detail as to the purpose of the legal advice, as in the original request.
- Please explain the relevance of the “Transition Period”.
- Please include details of the £2 million quoted by Councillor Osman and an explanation as to why it was not included in the original response.
3. Statutory Considerations
- Did the Council answer your request within the required timescale of 20 working days?
NO – The Council did not answer your request within the statutory timescales and was in fact some six weeks late. In answer to your question (1) I have interviewed the Officers concerned, and determined that the reasons were two-fold.
- The Officers collating the financial information did not respond within the time frame required due to the complications of the payments pending in the Transition Period.
- The information was incomplete and the response was delayed as Officers attempted to reconcile the figures
Delays such as this are not acceptable, Somerset County Council has an excellent record of FOI responses over the past year completing some 90% within the required timescales. I apologise once again for the delay on behalf of the Council.
- Did the Council confirm or deny it held the information?
YES – The Council confirmed it held some of the information requested, and explained that the information would not be complete until after the Transition Period in June.
In answer to your question (3) The Transition Period is the time after the negotiation has been completed but also includes the time taken to transfer staff and assets back to Somerset County Council. This time period includes continued legal support which could not be billed for prior to completion, hence the delay in completing the financial statements.
In answer to question (4), Councillor Osman was provided with an estimate for the purposes of satisfying media and public interest. As you will see from the figures included below, this was only an estimate and could not be included in a formal FOI response as information held by SCC.
The correct response should have been for the Council to have given you the payments information to date relating to the £2 million estimate provided by Councillor Osman, and to advise you that there were still payments pending.
- Did the Council provide the information requested?
PARTIAL – The Council gave you incomplete information; both in terms of the payments made and the description of the payments.
In answer to the question (2) I have included a brief description of why the law firms were engaged. Any further details have been exempted under Section 42 of the FOI Act which relates to protecting Legal and Professional Privilege; (Appendix 1).
This should have been done in the original response, and an explanation given as to why you did not receive this information.
- If the Council did not provide the information was the refusal clear?
No refusal was made by the Council.
- If the Council applied an exemption was it correct and was it explained?
The Council did not use any exemptions in the original response. I have included Section 42 (Legal and Professional Privilege) exemption which applies to providing detailed information relating to the payment totals detailed below.
- Did the Council offer appropriate advice and assistance?
YES - The Council did advise you of the delay in providing the full information.
- Did the Council advise you of the internal review process and your right of appeal to the ICO?
YES – The Council did advise you of the appeals procedure to both an Internal Review and to the Information Commissioner’s Office.
5. Conclusion
Overall, this review concludesthat:
- The original response was late for the reasons described. This does not excuse the delay as the information held should have been released and advice given that further data would be available in June. A complete set of information has been included as part of this review.
- The original response should have included high level descriptions of the information released as per the request; I have included these as part of the Internal Review.
- You raised a series of questions as part of your request for an Internal Review I believe these have been addressed.
6. Decision
The final decision of this review is that itupholdsyour complaint. If you have any questions regarding clarification of this review please contact Peter Grogan (Information Governance Manager) on the contact details given below.
If you are not content with the outcome of this Internal Review, you have the right to apply directly to the Information Commissioner’s Office for a further decision. The Information Commissioner can be contacted at:
Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire, SK9 5AF
-
Helpline on 0303 123 1113
Yours sincerely
Peter Grogan
Information Governance Manager
B Block, County Hall
Taunton, TA1 4DY
1 of 4
Appendix 1
Summary Expenditure Information relating to External Legal advice in relation to the SWOne Contract
Legal Firm / High level description / 2010 / 2011 / 2011/2012 / 2012/2013 / 2013/2014 / TOTALS£ / £ / £ / £ / £
Burgess Salmon / Day to day legal advice / 2,351 / 36,584 / 11,434 / 50,369
Cedr Solve / Procurement dispute mediation / 5,000 / 5,000
Foot Anstey / Day to day legal advice / 35,750 / 20,840 / 9,099 / 65,689
Osbourne Clarke / Day to day legal advice / 2,479 / 2,479
Trowers & Hamlin / Day to day legal advice / 34,821 / 34,821
Pinsent Masons / Contract negotiations & procurement dispute / 107,591 / 2,381,548 / 9,569 / 2,498,708
Delmara / Day to day legal advice / 2,347 / 2,347
43,101 / 202,315 / 2,404,428 / 9,569 / 2,659,413
1 of 4