The parties disputed the publication of materials relating to the exact placement of mobile phone masts. The operators wanted the information excepted from disclosure for fear of criminal acts and also said that disclosure would breach their database rights.
Held: The Regulations sought merely to transpose the Directive into UK law, and it must be to the Directive that the court should look. The court was divided on its own opinion of the result but agreed that the matter needed first to be referred to the European Court under the question: ‘Under Council Directive 2003/4/EC, where a public authority holds environmental information, disclosure of which would have some adverse effects on the separate interests served by more than one exception (in casu, the interests of public security served by article 4(2(b) and those of intellectual property rights served by article 4(2)(e)), but it would not do so, in the case of either exception viewed separately, to any extent sufficient to outweigh the public interest in disclosure, does the Directive require a further exercise involving the cumulation of the separate interests served by the two exceptions and their weighing together against the public interest in disclosure?’
Lord Hope, Deputy President, Lord Saville, Lady Hale, Lord Mance, Lord Collins
[2010] Env LR 20, [2010] UKSC 3, UKSC 2009/0168
Bailii Summary, Bailii, SC, SC Summ
Environmental Information Regulations 2004 (SI 2004 No 3391) 12(5)(a) 12(5)(c), Directive 2003/4/EC of 28 January 2003 on public access to environmental information, Rights in Database Regulations 1997 (SI 1997 No 3032), Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 3
England and Wales
Citing:
At first Instance – Office of Communications, Regina (on the Application of) v Information Commissioner Admn 8-Apr-2008
Appeal against order for disclosure of details of location, ownership and technical attributes of mobile phone cellular-based stations. . .
Appeal from – Office of Communications v The Information Commissioner CA 20-Feb-2009
Grounds for non-disclosure treated cumulatively
An applicant had requested disclosure of information regarding the environmental impact of electro-magnetic radiation from mobile phones. The court considered the balance between the need to disclose information and the maintaining of exceptions to . .
Cited – Sweden v Commission And Others (Law Governing The Institutions) ECJ 18-Jul-2007
ECJ Appeal Access to documents of the institutions Documents of the German authorities concerning the declassification of a site protected under the Directive on the conservation of natural habitats Refusal. . .
Cited – Sweden and Turco v Council and Others (Law Governing The Institutions) ECJ 29-Nov-2007
Where a member state submitted documents to a Community institution requesting that such docments be not disclosed to a third party, that request was to be treated as the beginning of a process of the institution asking whether they should not be . .
Cited – Turco and Kingdom of Sweden (supported by Denmark, Finland and The Netherlands) v Council of the European Union (supported by Commission of the European Communities and United Kingdom) ECJ 1-Jul-2008
ECJ Appeals Access to documents of the institutions Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 Legal opinion. . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Information, Environment, European, Intellectual Property
Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.395047