The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is to prioritise complaints made under the Freedom of Information Act (FoIA) where there is significant public interest
“Significant public interest” means if the issue is likely to involve large amounts of public money, or that the information may significantly impact vulnerable groups.
The ICO says that going forward it now will aim to allocate priority cases within four weeks and fast-track 15-20% of its caseload. In addition, it is targeting closing 90% of all the cases it receives within six months (up from its previous target of 80%).
The change caps 12 months of behind-the-scenes work the organisation has been undertaking to improve its FOI services. It said it will action such requests much quicker, as it has done the work to streamline its processes to better handle the volume and complexity of FoI complaints.
It also said it will focus more regulatory activity on any public authorities “failing systemically to meet their transparency obligations”.
“Like many public bodies, we at the ICO continue to face the long term challenge of doing more with less in real terms, so we have been looking at ways to improve our FoI services,” said UK Information Commissioner John Edwards.
That includes making better choices to ensure the body is delivering timely outcomes such as prioritising issues that will have the greatest impact.
Need for commitment
“We will be doing our part by adding pace to our work - but we need commitment from senior leaders across public authorities to drive FoI compliance within their organisations,” Edwards added.
In practical terms, that means investing the time and resources needed to ensure people are receiving clarity about what information they are entitled to within the legal timeframe, he warned.
The announcement is one of the main fruits of the ICO's late 2022 consultation on a then-new proposed framework to prioritise certain complaints while also delivering a swifter response to all incoming cases.
That was initiated due to a recognition that that FoI law is essential, ICO says, to a functioning democracy, and that delays in the current system were undermining its effectiveness.
Caseload reduction
The new targets will be kept under review and cover complaints made under both FoIA and the Environmental Information Regulations (EIR), with the reform seen as a key element in its ongoing strategic three-year vision, ICO25. That has also prompted a reduction of its caseload of 2,295 live complaints by almost two-thirds and delivered over 2,500 decision notices in the last 12 months, which is more than any other year in its history, the ICO claimed.
As well as improving how complaints are managed, the ICO is also taking more proactive action against public authorities that are systemically failing to comply with the law.
It has issued a number of practice recommendations to improve performance, including one last week for the Department for Work and Pensions that sets out improvements, in relation to the quality of responses and internal reviews. Last week, the ICO also issued its second FOI enforcement notice since the launch of its new FOI Regulatory Manual last year, requiring Lewisham Council to respond to hundreds of overdue requests for information.
The new criteria for prioritising FoI complaints include whether there is a high public interest in the information requested, and does it raise a new, unique or clearly high profile issue that should be looked at quickly?
Indicators of this, says the commissioner, may include whether:
- the case is subject to significant media interest – e.g., there are existing news reports related to the subject matter in the public domain;
- the case concerns an issue that is likely to involve a large amount of public money in the context of the size of the public body involved – e.g. a local council contract for provision of services across its whole area or a nationwide central government spend;
- the requester needs the information to respond to a live and significant public consultation and the time for achieving resolution is reasonable to inform the decision making process.
Another criteria is whether any groups or individuals likely to be significantly affected by the information requested. This may include information:
- which covers policies, events or other matters that potentially have a significant impact on vulnerable people or groups;
- that has a high potential impact or harm on a proportionately substantial number of people in relation to the information requested;
- that may directly affect the health or another personal issue of the requester or others, that means they need a swift resolution - e.g. it may impact on treatment or is about a live court case.
The next is whetherr prioritisation have significant operational benefits, or support those regulated. For example, is the request:
- novel, or could provide the basis for guidance or support for other regulated bodies;
- part of a round robin request or otherwise linked to other requests or appeals.
Finally, does the requester have the ability and desire to use the information for the benefit of the public? This may include where the requester has:
- a clear aim of raising awareness around a topic of significant public interest and the means or contacts to do so;
- access to a suitable platform to allow the public at large to use the requested information to scrutinise the decisions made in the public sector.
