Some interesting stats obtained by the Guardian’s own Freedom of Information (FOI) request to the corporation:

• Complying with requests made under the FOI act, since its introduction in 2005, have cost the BBC £3 million;
• FOI requests have risen from 971 in the first year of the act to 1,141 for up to the end of July this year.

Full story at this link…

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Catching up from news last week that the UK government has plans to extend the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to cover four new bodies: the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO), the Financial Services Ombudsman, the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) and Academy schools.

The UK’s Campaign for FOI has described the proposals as narrow in scope – for example, contractors providing a service on behalf of a public agency will be covered, but only if that service ‘is a function of the authority’.

Full post at this link…

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The Guardian has had its four-year campaign for the release of information about misbehaving members of the judiciary rejected by a Freedom of Information (FOI) tribunal.

The paper had been working on the request since 2005, reporter Rob Evans told Journalism.co.uk in March, and was challenging ’secret justice’ and asking for a more accountable judiciary.

“We are trying to create a precedent for this kind of information to be released. In the past the government has always kept it as a kind of secret. They have always been very reluctant to release information about naughty judges,” said Evans as the case went to tribunal.

But today the tribunal, led by David Marks QC, ruled in favour of Justice Secretary Jack Straw and suggested that releasing information on when judges, magistrates and coroners had been disciplined could be disruptive to courts and the legal process.

The tribunal was ‘”impressed” by the Ministry of Justice’s argument that judges were entitled to a “reasonable expectation of privacy”‘, according to a report in the Guardian.

“This is an outrageous decision. Judges are highly paid public servants whose conduct in court and, to an extent, out of court must be above reproach,” Evans told Journalism.co.uk today.

“It is fundamental that the public should know how complaints against judges are resolved and the reasons why particular judges have been reprimanded or sacked. Why is Jack Straw, the Justice Secretary, covering this information up? He seems to have learnt nothing from the MPs expenses’ debacle.”

The ministry has said it will be more open about the sacking of judges in the future as a result of the Guardian’s campaign. However, taking the full FOI request any further would entail high court action – an expensive procedure.

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Official documents, apart from ’sensitive information’, Royal Family and Cabinet papers, could be released after 20 years instead of 30 under new government proposals, Gordon Brown announced yesterday.

The government is also looking at extending the remit of the Freedom of Information (FoI) act to cover organisations that spend public money.

The measures will aim to improve the transparency of the UK parliament following the expenses scandal.

The official publication of the MPs expenses data by parliament will happen in the next few days, Brown added.

Full story at this link…

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Today’s story from the Liverpool Daily Post on council staff taking sick leave was the result of a Freedom of Information request made through democracy website www.whatdotheyknow.com.

And how do we know?

Because the source and links to the information released through the FOI request are included at the bottom of the article. A nice touch.

(Thanks to Andy Dickinson for telling us about this)

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In the second year of Freedom of Information (FOI) legislation, more than 1,000 stories based on disclosures made under the FOI act were reported in the regional and national newspapers in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland in 2006-7.

The figures, released in a report from the Campaign for Freedom of Information, are broken down into subject categories ranging from drugs and the economy, to ghosts and psychic powers.

Among the most popular topics (in no particular order) are:

• Policing with 128 stories from FOI requests – which doesn’t include a separate category on ‘policing costs’
• Health (110)
• Education (65)
• Transport (36)
• Prisons (35)

There’s even one FOI story on FOI from the Belfast Telegraph about the University of Ulster proposing to introduce fees for releasing information under FOI.

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