Applicability The Freedom of Information Act creates a statutory right for access to information in relation to bodies that exercise functions of a public nature. Three different kinds of bodies are covered under the act: Public Authorities, publicly owned companies and designated bodies performing public functions.
Public authorities In principle, the freedom of information act applies to all "public authorities" within the United Kingdom. A full list of "public authorities" for the purposes of the act is included in Schedule 1. Government departments, the
Houses of Parliament, the
Northern Ireland Assembly, the
Welsh Assembly, the armed forces, local government bodies,
National Health Service bodies, schools, colleges and universities, police authorities and Chief Officers of Police are included within this list, which ranges from the
Farm Animal Welfare Council to the Youth Council for Northern Ireland. A few government departments are expressly excluded from the scope of the act, principally
intelligence services. The act does not cover the
Scottish Parliament and
Scottish Government, which are instead subject to the
Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002. As government departments are created or closed, the act must be continually updated. Schedule 4 of the act empowers the
Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs to add a body or officeholder to Schedule 1 as a public authority if they are created statute or prerogative; and its members are appointed by the government.
Hybrid public authorities For some public authorities listed under Schedule 1, the act has limited effect. For example, the
BBC is subject to the act only for information which is not held for the purposes of journalism, art or literature, to prevent its journalistic activities from possible compromise. The scope of this provision was considered in the 2007
High Court decision of
BBC v Sugar, an internal BBC document examining the BBC coverage of the Middle East for potential bias. The appellants in that case argued that the document had been produced for both operational and journalistic reasons, and so should not be covered by the partial exemption provided in the act. The High Court rejected this argument; Mr Justice Irwin considered that the meaning of journalism within the act meant that any information held for such purposes was covered by the exemption: My conclusion is that the words in the Schedule mean the BBC has no obligation to disclose information which they hold to any significant extent for the purposes of journalism, art or literature, whether or not the information is also held for other purposes. The words do not mean that the information is disclosable if it is held for purposes distinct from journalism, art or literature, whilst it is also held to any significant extent for those listed purposes. If the information is held for mixed purposes, including to any significant extent the purposes listed in the Schedule or one of them, then the information is not disclosable. A 4:1 majority (Lord Wilson dissenting) of the Supreme Court upheld this decision, stating that the disclosure of any information held for the purposes of journalism, art or literature was to be excluded - even if the information was predominantly held for other purposes.
Publicly owned companies Companies that fall within the definition of a publicly owned company under s6 of the act automatically fall within its grasp. S6 provides that a company is publicly owned if: : (a) it is wholly owned by the Crown, or : (b) it is wholly owned by any public authority listed in Schedule 1 other than :: (i) a government department, or :: (ii) any authority which is listed only in relation to particular information.
Designated bodies Under Section 5 of the act, the Secretary of State may designate further bodies as public authorities under the act, provided that those bodies are exercising a function of a public nature or contracting to provide a service whose provision is a function of a public authority. The first order under section 5 (in November 2011) extended the list of public authorities to also include the
Association of Chief Police Officers, the
Financial Ombudsman Service and
UCAS. Schedule 1 of the act deliberately uses generic descriptions to ensure the legislation's wide application, and does not need to specifically mention every organisation classed as a public authority under FOIA.
Right of access The act creates a general right of access, on request, to information held by public authorities. On receipt of a freedom of information claim a public authority has two corresponding duties. First, a duty to inform a member of the public whether or not it holds the information requested (s1(1)(a)), and second, if it does hold that information, to communicate it to the person making that request (s1(1)(b)). As the corollary to this, the act thus grants the equivalent rights to a confirmation or denial and communication of relevant information to an individual making a request under the act. The basic duty is supplemented by an additional duty to aid individuals in making requests and ensuring that they frame their FOI requests appropriately. (s.16(1)) However, there are numerous exemptions. Some of these are absolute bars to disclosure; some are qualified, which means the public authority has to decide whether the public interest in disclosing the relevant information outweighs the public interest in maintaining the exemption. An applicant for information who considers that a request has been wrongly rejected may apply to the Information Commissioner, who has the power to order disclosure. However, such orders can be appealed to a specialist tribunal (the
Information Tribunal) and in some circumstances, the Government has the power to override orders of the Information Commissioner. Any person can request information under the act; this includes legal entities such as companies. There is no special format for a request. Applicants do not need to mention the act when making a request. Applicants do not have to give a reason for their request.
Exemptions Although the act covers a wide range of government information, the act contains a variety of provisions that provide for the exemption from disclosure of certain types of information. The act contains two forms of exemption: "absolute" exemptions that are not subject to any public interest assessment, they act as absolute bars to the disclosure of information; and "qualified" exemptions where a public interest test must be made, balancing the public interest in maintaining the exemption against the public interest in disclosing the information. The original Freedom of Information White Paper proposed 15 such exemptions, but the final Bill included 24, and not all of the initial 15 were included.
Absolute exemptions Exemptions designated "absolute exemptions" have no public interest test attached. The act contains eight such exemptions: • Information that is accessible by other means (s.21) • Information belonging to security services (s.23) • Information contained in court records (s.32) • Where disclosure of the information would infringe parliamentary privilege (s.34) • Information held by the House of Commons or the House of Lords, where disclosure would prejudice the effective conduct of public affairs (s.36). (Information that is not held by the Commons or Lords falling under s.36 is subject to the public interest test) • Information which (a) the applicant could obtain under the
Data Protection Act 1998; or (b) where release would breach the data protection principles. (s.40) • Information provided in confidence (s.41) • When disclosing the information is prohibited by an enactment; incompatible with a
European Union obligation; or would commit a contempt of court (s.44)
Qualified exemptions If information falls within a qualified exemption, it must be subject to a public interest test. Thus, a decision on the application of a qualified exemption operates in two stages. First, a public authority must determine whether or not the information is covered by an exemption and then, even if it is covered, the authority must disclose the information unless the application of a public interest test indicated that the public interest favours non-disclosure. Qualified exemptions can be subdivided into two further categories: class-based exemptions covering information in particular classes, and harm-based exemptions covering situations where disclosure of information would be liable to cause harm.
Class-based exemptions • Information intended for future publication (s.22) • Information which does not fall within s. 23(1) is exempt if required for the purpose of safeguarding national security (s.24) • Information held for purposes of investigations and proceedings conducted by public authorities (s.30) • Information relating to the formation of government policy, ministerial communications, advice from government legal officers, and the operation of any ministerial private office (s.35) • Information that relates to communications with members of the
Royal family, and conferring honours (s.37) • Prevents overlap between FoI Act and regulations requiring disclosure of environmental information (s.39) • Information covered by professional legal privilege (s.42) • Trade secrets (s.43(1))
Harm-based exemptions Under these exemptions the exemption applies (subject to the public interest test) if complying with the duty under s.1 would, or would be likely to: •
Prejudice defence or the capability, effectiveness or security of any relevant forces (s.26) • Prejudice international relations (s.27) • Prejudice relations between any administration in the United Kingdom and any other such administration (s.28) • Prejudice the economic interests of the UK (s.29) • Prejudice law enforcement (e.g., prevention of crime or administration of justice, etc.) (s.31) • Prejudice the auditing functions of any public authorities (s.33) • In the reasonable opinion of a qualified person: prejudice the effective conduct of public affairs; prejudice collective responsibility, or inhibit the free and frank provision of advice or exchange of views (s.36) • Endanger physical or mental health, or endanger the safety of the individual (s.38) • Prejudice commercial interests (s.43(2)).
Refusing requests Vexatious requests A public authority is not obliged to comply with a request for information if the request is vexatious (s14(1)). A request is considered vexatious if it is 'obsessive or manifestly unreasonable', harasses the authority or causes distress to its staff, imposes a significant burden, or if the request lacks any serious value.
Implementing the act The act affects over 100,000 public bodies including government departments, schools and councils. The act came into force in phases, with the final "general right of access" to public information under the act coming into force on 1 January 2005. As well as the "general right of access", the act places a duty on public authorities to adopt and maintain pro-active "publication schemes" for the routine release of important information (such as annual reports and accounts). These publication schemes must be approved by the Information Commissioner. In general, public authorities have 20 working days to respond to an information request, though this deadline can be extended in certain cases and/or with the agreement of the requester. Under the act, public authorities are encouraged to enter into a dialogue with the requester to better determine the information they want, and the format they want it in - in itself, a change in the way UK authorities interact with the public. Requests can be refused if they cost more than £600, including time spent searching for files. The UK Government established the
Access to Information Central Clearing House in order to ensure consistency across Central Government in the way requests are handled.
Contrasts with law in other jurisdictions Three aspects of the UK's Freedom of Information Act differ from the position in many other countries: • Requests by individuals for access to their own personal information are dealt with outside the act for most practical purposes. They are dealt with under the
Data Protection Act 2018 once it has been determined that the exemption for first party personal data is engaged, although some key provisions remain applicable e.g. the right of complaint to the Information Commissioner. • Requests for information about matters concerning the environment are dealt with by the
Environmental Information Regulations 2004. Those regulations, while similar to the FOIA, do differ in a number of ways. • There is no procedure whereby third parties can challenge a decision by a public authority to disclose information: for instance, if a commercial organisation provides information to a public authority, and the authority decides to disclose that information in response to an FOI Act request, the commercial organisation has no right of appeal against that decision. By contrast, "reverse FOI" applications of this type are common in the U.S. ==Reception==