Mr R made three related and overlapping requests for information to the Scottish Prison Service (SPS). The SPS’s responses provided some information and indicated that other information was not held, but in some instances failed to address certain parts of the request. Mr R was not satisfied with the SPS’s responses and sought reviews in each case. Following a review which addressed each request, Mr R remained dissatisfied and made two applications to the Commissioner for a decision, stating that the SPS had not provided all information he requested.
During the investigation, the SPS undertook further searches and identified and disclosed additional information relevant to Mr R’s requests. Following these additional disclosures, the Commissioner was satisfied that the SPS had addressed each of Mr R’s requests and provided relevant information.
However, the Commissioner identified a number of breaches of Part 1 of FOISA in the SPS’s handling of these requests and he was critical of the SPS for failing to conduct fuller searches to identify relevant information when it first responded to these. The Commissioner also found that the SPS had failed to provide reasonable advice and assistance to Mr R with respect to parts of his requests seeking information that was his own personal data.
Citations:
[2008] ScotIC 133 – 2008
Links:
Jurisdiction:
Scotland
Information
Updated: 21 July 2022; Ref: scu.434239