The complainant asked to be provided with all the information held by the Council’s Trading Standards Service in respect to a particular trader. The Council released a limited amount of information but withheld the remainder, citing the exemptions provided by section 30(2) (Investigations and Proceedings Conducted by Public Authorities) and sections 40(2) and (3) (Personal Information). The Commissioner has agreed that these sections of the Act were correctly applied to the information at issue but criticised the Council for failing to apply the public interest test required by section 30. The Commissioner took the view that the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighed the public interest in disclosing the information, but that it would be in the public interest to release some additional information in the form or a summary.
Section of Act/EIR and Finding: FOI 30 – Complaint Not upheld, FOI 40 – Complaint Not upheld
Citations:
[2006] UKICO FS50070184
Links:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Information
Updated: 11 July 2022; Ref: scu.533439