Information Commissioner's Annual Report 2010/11

The Information Commissioner's Annual Report for 2010/11 has been published. A press release accompanying the report highlights the continued progress made by the ICO in reducing the time taken to investigate freedom of information complaints:

Today's annual report also highlights the significant improvements the ICO has made in the time it takes to handle freedom of information complaints. There are now no cases over 12 months old, compared with three at the end of 2010/11, 117 at the end of 2009/10 and 418 two years ago. Process improvements and changes to the ICO's organisational structure made during the year enabled the ICO to complete more decision notices than ever before without sacrificing quality and no increase in the rate of appeals. 

The report is available to download here. A webcast of the report's launch with a presentation by Christopher Graham is available to watch here.

ICO consults on new Information Rights Strategy

The ICO is consulting on a new Information Rights Strategy, which will replace the former separate data protection and freedom of information strategies. It is being introduced in light of the ICO's commitment to integrate its data protection and freedom of information activities wherever possible.

The draft Information Rights Strategy is available here.

The consultation is open until 12 August 2011.

ICO specialist guidance published

The ICO have published their internal freedom of information and environmental information knowledge base on their website. The specialist guidance includes the ICO's lines to take documents, which "capture the Commissioner's position in relation to issues that have arisen in casework or as a result of Tribunal decisions". The LTT documents had previously been released via WhatDoTheyKnow in response to an FOI request by Alex Skene, who made them available in a more accessible manner on the FOI wiki which he hosts. The ICO has decided to make these routinely available together with several legal background papers and other policy resources, which were previously only accessible on the ICO intranet site.

ICO e-newsletter, April 2011

The April edition of the ICO's e-newsletter is available from:
http://www.ico.gov.uk/news/enewsletter/previous_enewsletters/English/201104.aspx

Sign up here:
https://www.ico.gov.uk/news/enewsletter/subscribe_to_enewsletter.aspx

Authorities facing regulatory action for FOI delays

The Information Commissioner's Office has announced that several public authorities, including the Cabinet Office and Ministry of Defence, are facing regulatory action for failing to reduce the time they take to respond to Freedom of Information requests:

The ICO monitored the performance of 33 public authorities for a period of three months, following concerns about delays in their responses to FOI requests. Of the 33 authorities, the ICO is in discussions with several organisations about the improvements they still need to put in place. The Commissioner has particular concerns about delays at the Cabinet Office, the Ministry of Defence and Birmingham City Council. Discussions on appropriate regulatory action are now taking place.

Four other authorities - the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, the London Borough of Islington, Wolverhampton City Council and Westminster City Council - have been asked to sign undertakings to improve their performance in this area.

The remaining 26 authorities have maintained or improved their response times sufficiently, and no action is being taken against them. However, the ICO has sent letters to the Home Office, the Metropolitan Police Service, NHS North West, the London Borough of Croydon, the Scotland Office and the London Borough of Newham to put on record that, while all of them are now meeting the required standard, the monitoring has revealed some areas of concern.

Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham, said:

“I am delighted that over two thirds of the authorities whose performance we have been monitoring have managed to overcome their problems. However, the remaining authorities have not done enough to convince us that they have a clear and credible plan for getting back on track. Over the next four weeks, we shall be discussing appropriate next steps with them.”

The ICO has also published its latest list of authorities whose performance is being monitored. These are:

• Barnsley Metropolitan Council
• City of London Police
• Cornwall Council
• Department for Education
• East Lancashire NHS Trust
• Equality and Human Rights Commission
• Highways Agency (an Executive Agency of the Department for Transport)
• Kent County Council
• Kirklees Council
• London Borough of Southwark
• NHS South West London (Wandsworth Borough Team – formerly NHS Wandsworth)
• North East Lincolnshire Council
• North Somerset Council
• Nottingham City Council
• Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames
• Surrey County Council
• Surrey Police
• Waveney District Council

ICO seminar on privacy and anonymous data

ICO news release
30 March 2011

Being anonymous ‘an ever increasing challenge’ in 2011, says Information Commissioner

Advances in the internet, the scale of personal information that is collected by public bodies and businesses, and the pressure to share data in the name of efficiency, make being anonymous in 2011 ‘an ever increasing challenge’ Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham, will say today at a seminar the ICO is hosting on anonymisation.

Leading academics and experts from the public sector and business will gather at the Wellcome Trust in London today to consider different perspectives and approaches to anonymisation – the process of removing personal identifiers from information. Speaking alongside the Information Commissioner are Paul Ohm from the University of Colorado, Mark Elliot from the University of Manchester as well as representatives from the Cabinet Office and the Office of National Statistics.

The ICO will publish a report in the coming weeks that will summarise the seminar’s key discussion points as well as setting out next steps.

Full press release here.

Local Government Lawyer interviews Deputy Information Commissioner Graham Smith

As local authorities and other public bodies continue to grapple with freedom of information and data protection, Philip Hoult speaks to Deputy Information Commissioner (and former local government lawyer) Graham Smith about monetary penalties, vexatious litigants, spending cuts and the inexorable rise of requests for information.

Full interview here.

Campaign's response to Government's plans to extend the FOI Act

The Campaign for Freedom of Information has welcomed the coalition government’s announcement (see earlier post here) that it proposed:

• to extend the FOI Act to a range of regulatory, representative and other bodies 
• to implement the last government’s measures to release old government records after 20 years instead of 30 years
• apply the Act to companies that are jointly owned by more than one public authority.

The Campaign said these were valuable improvements to the FOI regime.

However it pointed out that before the election both the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats had promised that Network Rail would be covered and that the Conservatives’ had also promised to cover Northern Rock. Neither body is being covered. Many other individual bodies, including electoral registration officers and returning officers should also be added, the Campaign said.

It also called for companies providing contracted out functions to be brought under the Act, particularly those relating to health, social services, education and criminal justice and for the Act to be extended to housing associations. The Campaign pointed out that the Scottish Government was proposing to extend the Scottish FOI Act to contractors who build or maintain schools, hospitals and roads (where the contract value is above certain thresholds), to private bodies running prisons or providing prison escort services to contractors running local authority sports or leisure centres and to the Glasgow Housing Association.

The Campaign said it was also unhappy at the decision to implement a more restrictive exemption for senior members of the Royal Family. At present, communications with the Royal Family are exempt, but potentially disclosable on public interest grounds. In future the public interest test will be removed for communications with the monarch and the next two in line to the throne. The Campaign said that where Prince Charles was seeking to actively intervene in policy decisions, his input would be withheld in all circumstances, even if it had played the decisive role.

Finally, the Campaign suggested the proposal to allow the Information Commissioner to serve for only a single 5 year term was a potentially double-edged sword. Limiting appointment to a single term only meant that the Commissioner could not be tempted to comply with the government’s wishes in order to be reappointed. But appointing a new Commissioner every 5 years could be potentially disruptive, as a new Commissioner needed at least a year to master the brief, and the Campaign suggested the Commissioner’s term of appointment should be extended to 6 or 7 years.

Full press release here.

ICO under financial pressure from MoJ

The minutes from the latest Information Commissioner's management board meeting show that the ICO is facing significant financial pressure from the Ministry of Justice.

It was reported that £160k of grant in aid had been surrendered to the MoJ as year-in savings...The MoJ had however asked about further in-year savings of grant in aid. Discussions with the MoJ were ongoing. It was noted that the business case for £500k of grant in aid to clear the backlog of freedom of information cases this year has yet to be agreed.

Any reduction in grant-in-aid risks reversing the substantial progress that has been made by the ICO in reducing the backlog over the last 12-18 months.

ICO publishes list of bodies being monitored for FOI delays

The Information Commissioner's Office has today published a list of public authorities which it is monitoring because it appears they are not meeting the FOI Act's time limits:

In putting the list together the ICO looked at the number of complaints it had received, published data showing where less than 85% of requests had received a response within appropriate timescales and also occasions where authorities had exceeded time limits by a significant margin.

The ICO’s Deputy Commissioner, Graham Smith said:

‘In the five years since the Freedom of Information Act was brought into force, a significant number of the complaints we receive are about organisations that take too long to respond to information requests.

‘We will monitor the authorities named today for three months, but may take action during this timeframe if an authority’s standard of compliance is revealed to be particularly poor, or if it is unwilling to make the improvements necessary.

‘This is a perfect opportunity for the authorities named to get their houses in order and demonstrate that they take freedom of information requests seriously.’

See:
Full press release
List of monitored bodies

FOI Act shines a torch on public services, says Information Commissioner

ICO Press release
28 September 2010

“Freedom of Information has a key role to play in helping to deliver greater transparency and accountability. These are key priorities in public policy”, says Information Commissioner Christopher Graham in a message to mark International Right to Know Day.

International Right to Know Day is designed to raise awareness of individuals’ rights to access information held by public authorities and gain better understanding of how public money is spent.

Christopher Graham says: “Freedom of Information shines a torch into the dark corners of public service, identifying wasted money and duplication of effort. Freedom of Information must have paid for itself many times over in the beneficial impact it has had on reducing unnecessary spending – and that contribution can only increase in the years ahead.

“Organisations, whether public or private, need to invest in information rights - whether it’s Freedom of Information, good records management, or data protection. Where organisations fall down on their information rights obligations they do so at the cost of destroying citizen and consumer trust.”

Under the Freedom of Information Act, public authorities are required to operate a Publication Scheme. Under this scheme authorities must produce a guide to the information they hold and are encouraged to publish as much information as possible as a matter of routine.

Christopher Graham continues: “In the current circumstances of reduced budgets and increased concern for transparency and accountability, information rights are a front line service, not a mere back office function. We all have to do more for less, but much is expected of all of us working in the information rights field.”

Over the past 12 months, Decision Notices by the ICO have ordered the disclosure of the Youth Justice Board Physical Control in Care Prison Service manual, details of bonuses received by the City of London Police Force and information relating to the amount the BBC spends on taxi booking services.

“These headline successes by the ICO are only part of the story,” says Mr Graham. “More and more, public authorities are volunteering to publish information without being ordered to do so by the Information Commissioner. That means less money is being wasted on long drawn out investigations and appeals.”

Ends

http://www.ico.gov.uk/upload/documents/pressreleases/2010/irtk_day_280910.pdf

ICO discloses "Line to Take" policy documents

The Information Commissioner's Office has recently disclosed all of its "Lines to Take" policy documents which set out how the ICO approaches certain types of Freedom of Information complaints. The disclosure follows a request by Alex Skene, a volunteer who helps maintain the WhatDoTheyKnow.com website.

There are 177 documents in total, which were disclosed in 6 PDF files. However, Alex has helpfully made them available in a more structured, searchable and easier to use manner via the FOI wiki he hosts:

http://foiwiki.com/foiwiki/index.php/LTT

Relevant LTTs can also be accessed via their associated FOI Act exemption page, eg http://foiwiki.com/foiwiki/index.php/Section41.

The documents are a fantastic resource for FOI requesters and public authorities alike.

ICO FOI caseload progress

More on publication of the Information Commissioner's 2010 Annual Report which outlined the significant progress that has been made in reducing the backlog of FOI complaints, which was seriously undermining the effectiveness of the FOI Act. The report states that the ICO now has 1,035 open cases, 439 fewer than at the start of the year. Despite a 20% increase in complaints to the ICO in 2009/10, there was a 39% increase in the number of cases closed. 628 cases were closed with a decision notice, more than double the 295 in the previous year. The report contained the following table showing the age profile of open cases on 31 March 2010 compared to 1 April 2009.

Another table shows that 82% of cases closed were less than a year old. This is a tremendous turnaround from the position highlighted in a report on 'Delays in investigating Freedom of Information Complaints' published by the Campaign for Freedom of Information in July 2009 and extremely welcome news for requesters.

The frustration that delays cause requesters was highlighted by Ann Clwyd MP in a debate in Westminster Hall on 13 July 2010.

...the advent of the Freedom of Information Act should be celebrated. It was one of the triumphs of the Labour Government, and it enables us, the public, to subject public authorities to the kind of scrutiny that was never possible before. It gives us access to all the inconvenient and embarrassing bits of information that some public authorities would rather not disclose.

However, public confidence and the effectiveness of the Act are being undermined by the difficulty in pursuing complaints against authorities that refuse to release information that the Act requires them to release. The problem is that it is just too easy for public authorities to obstruct the process. If they ignore enough letters, miss enough deadlines and pretend that they do not really know what is happening and why, they will be able successfully to evade an information request for a long enough period to diminish the detrimental impact, reduce embarrassment and avoid the accountability that release of the information would cause...

Responding to the debate, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Jonathan Djanogly said:

The current economic climate is, of course, extremely challenging, but the Government are committed to providing the ICO with the best deal possible to maintain its progress and to fulfil its vital role. I have to say that this is not just about money; it is also about people and expertise. I am sure that the right hon. Lady will be interested to know that three experienced caseworkers have been seconded from central Government, helping to cut through the ICO's backlog.

The commissioner has made great strides to improve the efficiency of his operation to provide increasing value for money. That is evidenced in the remarkable increase in case clearance that I have just mentioned.

...It is important that we continue to support the commissioner, as his work is at the heart of the Government's transparency agenda. The commissioner will publish his annual report tomorrow and the right hon. Lady will have the opportunity to see it. I am sure that she will be pleased to note the steps that the Government have already taken and will continue to take to make more information available to the public, shedding light on public affairs, from the corridors of Whitehall to the meeting rooms of borough councils and local schools.

The right hon. Lady specifically asked me to say whether the commissioner has enough power to regulate the freedom of information regime effectively. We believe that, as things stand, that is so. The powers are there.

Read the full debate here.

ICO annual report: information rights go centre stage

Press release
14 July 2010

The information watchdog is handling record levels of business and productivity is dramatically up, the Information Commissioner’s Annual Report for 2009/10 shows.

Speaking at the annual report launch today, the Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham will say that the watchdog is in pole position to deliver on the agenda of transparency, accountability, privacy and freedom.

“We’ve never been busier,” says the Commissioner, reporting a 20% rise in freedom of information cases and a 30% rise in data protection cases. “But despite the surge in business, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is keeping on top of the demand for our services.” The office closed 39% more cases than in 2008/09.

Christopher Graham says: “Technology, concerns about data security and the welcome focus on transparency of official information mean information rights are centre stage. We have made some significant internal changes to ensure we are best placed to deal with the increasing demands and expectations placed upon us by the public and the organisations we work with. Respect for information rights is not optional.  Organisations that ignore their responsibilities will not only lose the confidence and trust of citizens and consumers but could face painful enforcement action from the ICO as well.”

In 15 months the ICO has reduced a historic backlog of freedom of information complaints. The number of cases closed in 2009/10 increased by 39% on the previous year to 4,196.  At the same time the ICO has dealt with more enquiries than ever - in 2009/10 the ICO received 3,734 freedom of information complaints, up 20% compared to 2008/09.

With a new ICO mission statement and increased regulatory powers, Mr Graham uses his annual report to call for the Information Commissioner to report directly to Parliament, as in the case of the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, to increase transparency around the reporting and financing arrangements of the ICO.

Christopher Graham, Information Commissioner, says: “I believe that the ICO has not just to be independent of government, but be seen to be independent. To carry out my duties effectively and with the full confidence of all parties, now is the time to formalise the governance arrangements for the Information Commissioner, suitable for an independent public official whose accountability is fully to Parliament, rather than primarily via Departments of State.”

The annual report highlights that the ICO received over 212,000 calls to its helpline in 2009/10 – a 6% increase compared to 2008/09. It received 33,234 enquiries and complaints concerning personal information. Failing to adequately deal with requests for personal information topped the list of complaints to the ICO under the Data Protection Act. Lenders came top of the list of sectors generating the most complaints under the Act.

A full copy of the annual report can be downloaded from the ICO website.

PQ: ICO average case closure time

10 Jun 2010 : Column 213W

Annette Brooke: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what the average time taken to resolve complaints made to the Information Commissioner's office was in the latest period for which figures are available; and if he will make a statement. [1517]

Mr Blunt: The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) divides the complaints it receives into two categories: Data Protection and Freedom of Information. The latest period for which figures for the average time taken to resolve complaints are available is 1 January to 31 March 2010.

The ICO closed its oldest FOI cases during this period which has affected the average age of cases closed. On 1 April 2009 the average age of live FOI cases was 286 days but by 1 April 2010 this had fallen to 150 days.

This information has been provided by the ICO.

Information Commissioner interview with Public Servant magazine

There is an interview with the Information Commissioner Christopher Graham in the April 2010 edition of Public Servant magazine, which is now available online.

"We are off the back foot and organisations have to respond to a more robust ICO," he explains. "Some of them have learnt the hard way. For example, the London Development Agency didn't want to make information available about certain land acquisitions in connection with the Olympics. And they kept changing the grounds on which they were withholding the information, so we got to the position where we said 'we will publish the decision notice with the information we have to hand'.

"It can't go on forever. At some point, you have to call people's bluff. I also let it be known to the Cabinet Office that I wouldn't hesitate to issue an information notice – it's the sort of thing you only have to threaten. If anyone was tempted to game the system, that has now stopped.

"All the permanent secretaries heard me say recently that we are getting tougher. I borrowed the slogan from Sainsbury's – 'you'll taste the difference'. Nobody is under any illusion any longer that information requests can just be spun out forever.
...
But he acknowledges that large quantities of routine information are still not being published without legal challenge.

"An awful lot of public money is currently being wasted in rather futile fights over appeals and High Court cases," admits Graham. "We have one case involving the location of mobile phone masts that is going from the Supreme Court to the European Court and you just think: 'can this be right – how much money is going to m'learned friends?' The civil service mindset has to become a bit more modern.

"Because of the times in which we live and the impact of the internet, public authorities really need to get engagement with citizens. You get local authorities that are good at this and those old-fashioned councils that are bad at it. Where councils are on the front foot, people feel involved and consulted – whether it is over a 20mph speed limit on residential streets or how the money is spent on local parks.

"It is usually the same authorities that don't do FoI very well that also don't do things like children's services and financial management very well. I am a great believer in hitting people with the boring facts; they are usually much less interesting than the conspiracy theories."

Full article here.

Home Affairs Committee evidence on work of the Information Commissioner's Office

An uncorrected transcript of the evidence given by the Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham, and Assistant Commissioner, Jonathan Bamford, to the Home Affairs Committee on 9 March 2010 has been published.

Q4 Mr Winnick: Thank you very much indeed. In January of this year The Times noted that your office has limited resources, no powers to speed up the freedom of information process and that the Office is limited by not having the final say in freedom of information appeals. Do you recognise these constraints? Do you think they are unfair, or do you think the comments were unfair?

Mr Graham: I do not believe all I read in the newspapers. I would comment that all public authorities have limited resources. We are unusual in that there is some buoyancy in our resources, at least on the data protection side, because of the introduction of a tiered notification fee. The largest concerns now pay £500 instead of £35 and that is giving us more money to spend on the data protection side of the business. On the freedom of information side of the business we have had a spectacularly productive year. We are closing outstanding cases, getting through the backlog, and this is despite the fact that there is a great public appetite for using the Freedom of Information Act - good. It does mean that applications to the ICO are up by more than 20%, but case closures are up by more than 40%. This is not an organisation that is suffering from restraint. On powers, next month we see greatly strengthened powers on the data protection side - the introduction of civil monetary penalties, the ability to audit government departments without consent. There is an awful lot going on at the ICO.
...
Mr Graham: I am going to ask Jonathan to comment on the data protection side in a minute, but the great challenge when I took on the role of Information Commissioner at the end of June last year was to tackle the backlog in freedom of information cases, and this we are doing. This is a week of tremendous activity because we are determined to clear some of the old cases before the end of our performance year and I am confident that in our annual report we will be able to tell a very good story of the speeding up. Freedom of information cases, if they come to us, which is on appeal, are almost certainly going to be difficult and intractable, but what we have succeeded in doing over the past few months is to send a message to public authorities that we are on their case, and so there is no question of just refusing information because you think it will take the ICO a long time to get round to it. If we were in a vicious circle, we are now in a positive cycle where the public authorities realise that the ICO is very alert and they had better get on with it and that is having a very beneficial effect.

The Commissioner was also asked about the Private Members' Bill introduced by David Maclean MP, which sought to exempt Parliament from the scope of the FOI Act and create a new exemption for MPs' communications with public authorities, by David Winnick MP who was one of the MPs who tried to block the Bill in the Commons:

Q9 Mr Winnick: Mr Graham, Parliament makes its own rules and the electorate will decide, as always, accordingly, but if Parliament had gone ahead and exempted itself from the freedom of information legislation, which at one stage was a possibility - there was a Private Members' Bill - what do you think the effect would have been generally in the media and on the public?

Mr Graham: That is a very hypothetical question.

Q10 Mr Winnick: It is bound to be, is it not?

Mr Graham: The controversy was before my time. If we are going to re-run history, I suppose the great might-have-been is what would have happened if Parliament had been inclined to go with my predecessor's steer and had published the expenses under more general headings. This, of course, was before we knew about flipping of second homes, so the regime might not have lasted very long, but it was Parliament's determination to challenge the ruling of the Information Commissioner and to challenge the ruling of the Information Tribunal and take it to the highest court in the land, and the highest court in the land, as you know, turned round and said, "Publish the lot", which was more than the Information Commissioner had requested. If you say, therefore, "How would it have gone?", I think you would have drawn the wrath of the public upon yourself if you had exempted yourselves. I think it would have been better if, in not exempting yourselves, you had realised that this was real and the law that applied to everybody else also applied to Parliament, but it is easy to be wise after the event.

Mr Winnick: Wisdom, fortunately, prevailed and you know what happened.

 Read the transcript in full here.

ICO seeking comments on draft corporate plan 2010-2013

The Information Commissioner's Office is seeking comments on its draft corporate plan for 2010-13. The ICO's website states:

Our Draft Corporate Plan 2010-2013 outlines a three year view of what we need to do to deliver our mission and achieve our vision – upholding information rights in the public interest.

We are now seeking comments on our proposals to make sure we measure up to the expectations of our stakeholders. Please read the draft and if you wish e-mail comments to jonathan.kay@ico.gsi.gov.uk. In particular we would like to know:

• Do you think the roles the ICO will play - enforcer and educator - are the right ones? (page 6, 7)

• Have we missed any key audiences out? (page 4, 5)

• Are our priorities right? Is there anything that shouldn’t be in there? Is there anything we’ve missed out? (pages 8-14)

• Do you think our plans for how we’re going to develop our workforce and direct the ICO are appropriate? (pages 15-17)

• Do you think our timescales are realistic and appropriate (pages 18-22)

• How would you measure our success? (page 23)

The consultation period will end on Friday 16 April 2010

 The draft corporate plan 2010-2013 can be downloaded here. 

Information Commissioner's e-newsletter edition 16

The January 2010 edition of the ICO's e-newsletter has been published:

http://www.ico.gov.uk/tools_and_resources/enewsletter_and_alerts/previous_enewsletters/English/Edition16.aspx

Information Commissioner: progress on FOI backlog

In the Justice Committee evidence session on Tuesday 5 January, the Information Commissioner outlined the progress that has been made in clearing the backlog of FOI complaints:

Christopher Graham: Over the past 6 months, we've put great priority on clearing the backlog and the figures are actually more encouraging than the figures that the minister quoted in the debate [adjournment debate] simply because things have accelerated like a train so the latest figures are better. If I can help the Committee, despite the fact that receipts of appeals to the Information Commissioner's Office are markedly up over the same period last year, in the period April to December 2009 compared to 2008 we've had a 21% increase in business, at the same time we've had a 43% increase in closures...We have already closed more cases in the first 9 months of the financial year, than in the whole of 2008-2009. Overall, since April, our caseload has dropped by 30% and the cases over a year old are now down by 52%. The very old cases, which is what we prioritise to get rid of, those cases over 2 years old are down by 70% and when perhaps later on I'm able to come and talk about our annual report, I think I will have an even more encouraging picture. I won't say it's satisfactory we're in the position we're in but we are making great strides in clearing the backlog, which I said to the Committee was a priority because, if you remember, I said unless we can demonstrate that we're an effective body, we won't be listened to on any other issue.

Chairman: In a letter you sent to me you indicated that, of course, some of the problems aren't caused by your office they're caused by repeatedly having to go back to government departments to get the information but there's a more robust attitude and I paraphrase slightly to that process might assist in speeding up the outcomes. Have you had any success in indicating to departments they've got to get a move on?

Christopher Graham: Yes, I think public authorities in general have got the message that the ICO is speeding up and we're onto the case. I give you an example of a decision notice we took about land acquisitions for the olympics. The London Development Agency understood from us that unless they could answer our questions and put up their best case, we would take a decision on the information we had to hand and that's what we did and that message gets across. I've been invited to address permanent secretaries at Sir Gus O'Donnell's meeting on 20 January and the message I will be putting is that we're generally being a tougher partner to deal with. And as we wire through the backlog, we are getting onto cases more quickly, the message I think will get across and we should be able to speed up generally. But it's very important to recognise that it's not just whether the Information Commissioner's Office is getting through the work, it's whether the public authorities are responding promptly enough either in the first place to Freedom of Information enquiries or to our enquiries in the course of an investigation.

You can listen to the evidence in full here.