FOI Disclosure Stories August 2011

Papers reveal fears over ports’ millions proposal – News Letter 16/08/111
Stormont minister Danny Kennedy was warned that moves to take funds from Belfast port could be challenged in the courts. The concerns were contained in briefing papers which were requested by the News Letter under the Freedom of Information Act. The Department for Regional Development intended to black out large chunks of the documents but actually highlighted the areas which it wanted to hide.

Gateways using nurses to screen GP referrals – Pulse 10/08/11
GP referrals are being screened and bounced back to general practice by nurses, physiotherapists and even podiatrists employed by PCTs to staff referral management centres, a Pulse investigation reveals. Data supplied under the Freedom of Information Act shows PCTs that operate referral management centres to reduce the number of GP referrals to secondary care are commonly using non-doctors for triage.

Scottish Review celebrating a victory on salaries of ‘fatcat’ NHS board managers – The Drum 08/08/11
Scottish current affairs website editor Kenneth Roy is celebrating a major victory in a two-year battle to force NHS regional health boards to reveal the salaries of top managers. He achieved this by putting in freedom of information requests to dig up the salaries of the top execs.

Birmingham City Council awarded PwC £250k contract without tendering – Birmingham Post 04/08/11
An inquiry is under way after Birmingham City Council broke its own rules by failing to put a £254,000 contract with financial consultants PricewaterhouseCoopers out to tender. Details of the contracts for PwC and Taylor Haig emerged following a Freedom of Information Act question from Larry Brown, a member of the public.

Shortfall in affordable housing - Countryside Alliance 04/08/11
Research undertaken by the Countryside Alliance shows how local councils have failed to meet provision targets for affordable housing on average by over 76 per cent in the past year. A Freedom of Information request was sent to all local authorities in order to obtain the data.

Courts forced to disclose written arguments – The Times (subscription only) 03/08/11
A landmark ruling by senior judges has struck a blow for open justice that will force courts in future to disclose all the written arguments in cases before them. The Court of Appeal has ruled that HM Revenue and Customs must comply with a request made by a barrister under the Freedom of Information Act to disclose their outline arguments.

More than 2,000 charities and community groups face cuts – False Economy 02/08/11
More than 2,000 charities and community groups are facing budget cuts as local authorities reduce their funding – or in some cases completely withdraw it – according to research based on hundreds of Freedom of Information responses from local councils published by False Economy.

Police admit one in three crimes not investigated – The Times (subscription only) 02/08/11
Figures obtained by The Times according to responses under the Freedom of Information Act for 21 of the 43 police forces in England and Wales show that the overall rate of crimes being dropped from further investigation is remarkably constant nationally and runs at about 32 per cent.

Cuts threaten traveller children’s schooling – The Independent 02/08/11
The schooling of up to 100,000 children in the travelling community is being put at risk by cuts to council funding, an investigation by The Independent has revealed. Nearly half of 127 authorities have either abolished their traveller education service or drastically cut staff levels, Freedom of Information responses show.

Care homes cash in on resident’s death – The Times (subscription only) 01/08/11
Care homes are making tens of thousands of pounds each year from the deaths of residents. Council records show that care providers are taking up to six months to inform their local authority that a resident has died, meaning they continue to receive taxpayers’ money to fund that resident’s care. Of 20 councils surveyed by The Times under the Freedom of Information Act, 14 admitted overpaying care home providers after the deaths of residents in the past year.

Public consultation on Digital Economy Act a sham? – Techradar.com 01/08/11
Freedom of information requests have revealed that Peter Mandelson, the UK's then Business Secretary of State, made the decision to sanctify aspects of the Digital Economy Act, even as the public consultation was under way.

Cuts leave patients waiting months for mental health help – The Times (subscription only) 01/08/11
A growing number of patients suffering from depression and other mental health problems are waiting more than three months for counselling in the latest sign of the impact of financial pressures on NHS services. Data collected from 120 Primary Care Trusts in England under the Freedom of Information Act shows that in those trusts that provide access to trained counsellors, more than 40 per cent leave patients waiting three months.

SNP rapped by water regulator – The Scotsman 31/07/11
Ministers have been told that their insistence on keeping Scottish Water in public ownership is hampering the company's efforts to fix the country's antiquated pipe network. Documents released under Freedom of Information legislation reveal an internal memorandum sent two years ago warning that bosses at Scottish Water were "increasingly concerned" they would not be able to afford repairs if the company remained funded solely by the government.

Private healthcare group lobbied competition body for NHS inquiry – Guardian 29/07/11
The close links between a private sector lobby group and an NHS regulator in the run-up to the launch of a groundbreaking inquiry into competition in the health service have emerged in a series of documents passed to the Guardian. Emails released under the Freedom of Information Act show that the lobby group NHS Partners Network helped draft a letter requesting a formal investigation into how firms were being blocked from getting NHS work.

FOI Disclosure Stories July

OK, climate sceptics: here's the raw data you wanted - New Scientist 28/07/07
Temperature records going back 150 years from 5113 weather stations around the world were yesterday released to the public by the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia. The university were ordered to release data by the UK Information Commissioner's Office following a freedom-of-information request for the raw data from researchers.
See the data here.

Cataracts, hips, knees and tonsils: NHS begins rationing operations – The Independent 28/07/11
Hip replacements, cataract surgery and tonsil removal are among operations now being rationed in a bid to save the NHS money. The alarming figures emerged from a survey of 111 PCTs by the health-service magazine GP, using the Freedom of Information Act.

Exclusive: Cameron breaks his Sure Start promise – New Statesman 27/07/11
27 centres have been closed since May 2010 despite Cameron's promise to protect funding, according to information released after freedom of information requests were made by the New Statesman to the Department for Education.

Children and young people’s mental health services slashed by funding cuts – Young Minds 27/07/11
A survey of health trusts and councils has found that more than half have cut their budgets for children and young people’s mental health services for 2011/2012. A Freedom of Information request sent to 120 service providers and commissioners generated 55 responses, of which 29 said they would reduce spend in this area.

Ministry of Defence spends £1 billion on staff credit cards – The Telegraph 27/07/11
Over the past four years, the MoD spent £986,041,110 on department credit cards, far more than any other government body according to a data released by the Cabinet Office following freedom of information request. The disclosure will add to concerns over the management of the ministry, which is grappling with a multi-billion pound black hole in its finances.

Children endure seven-month wait for wheelchairs – Children & Young People Now 26/07/11
Hundreds of disabled children are being forced to wait more than seven months to be assessed and provided with the mobility equipment they need, an investigation by CYP Now has revealed through figures obtained from freedom of information requests sent to all 151 primary care trusts, and answered in full by 40 areas.

Substandard care linked to maternal deaths in London – BBC 25/07/11
Panorama used Freedom of Information requests to survey the provision of maternity services across the UK. The findings reveal that maternity units temporarily closed their doors to new admissions 1055 times in 2010, resulting in at least 927 women needing to be transferred to other maternity units.

Fifth of patients left in learning disability hospitals for five years – Community Care 19/07/11
Nearly one in five people in learning disability hospitals such as Winterbourne View have been there for more than five years. Information gathered under the Freedom of Information Act from 32 primary care trusts, covering 247 patients, showed 18% had been in hospitals for five years or more and 3% had been resident for more than 10.

The Arbroath Schools review: the scandal of the public opinion surveys – For Argyll 18/07/11
Angus Council consulted the public on merging two schools into one new school through two surveys. An FOI request was issued for a breakdown of the survey results. The data released showed both of these surveys to have been profoundly manipulated. In the first survey it emerged that 399 (57.4%) of the responses had come from the same IP address, effectively the same computer and most likely the same individual.

Call for councils to remove £1bn in pension funds from tobacco firms – The Guardian 17/07/11
Doctors have claimed that councils are profiting from deaths through smoking by investing tens of millions of pounds of their pension funds in tobacco firms. They have spoken out after freedom of information requests by a health campaigner in the south-west of England revealed that seven local authorities in that region have made investments of £103.8m.

FOI Disclosure Stories June 19th- July 7th

More than 100 death risk leaks in North Sea oil rigs in two years – The Daily Record 07/07/11
More than 100 potentially lethal oil and gas spills took place on rigs in the North Sea in the last two years, a probe has highlighted. Damning statistics showing serious spills on oil and gas platforms at the rate of one a week were revealed under freedom of information legislation.

GPs left in limbo as PCTs shed staff and pay millions in redundancy costs – GP 05/07/07
PCTs have seen a mass exodus of staff almost two years before the transition to GP commissioning, with some already shedding up to a third of their workforce, a Pulse investigation reveals. Figures from 54 PCTs obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show they have each shelled out an average of £585,000 in redundancy and voluntary resignation costs – meaning the bill across England is likely to be more than £88m so far.

Revealed: The thousands of pregnancies aborted for ‘abnormalities’ including cleft palates and Down’s syndrome – The Daily Mail 05/07/11
Thousands of pregnancies were aborted last year for 'abnormalities' including 500 for Down's syndrome, new figures reveal. The statistics for 2010 in England and Wales were released after the Department of Health yielded to a Freedom of Information Request from the Pro Life Alliance, following a five-year legal battle.

One in three PCTs restricts prescriptions – Gponline 04/07/11
One in three PCTs has issued guidance restricting prescriptions to 28 days' treatment at a time, despite opposition from patients and GPs, our investigation has found. Of 104 PCTs that replied to a Freedom of Information request, 32% said they had issued guidance advising GPs to limit prescriptions to 28 days' supply at a time. A further 11% said they promoted such practice.

Some families still receiving £100,000 a year in housing benefit, latest figures reveal – The Telegraph 04/07/11
As the Coalition Government faces mounting criticism over plans to cap housing benefit at £500 per week, figures obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, show that some local authorities in the capital are still to paying private landlords up to four times that amount.

H.R.H. The Prince Minister: Charles accused of meddling after he summons seven senior Ministers to Clarence House in just ten months - Mail On Sunday 03/07/11
Prince Charles has been accused of meddling in Government policy after a Mail on Sunday investigation revealed he has had at least nine private meetings with Ministers in less than ten months according to documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act

Revealed: British government’s plans to play down Fukushima – The Guardian 30/06/11
Internal emails show a PR campaign was launched to protect UK nuclear plans after tsunami in Japan. Internal emails released by the Department for Energy and Climate Change show how the business and energy departments worked closely behind the scenes with multinational companies to try to ensure the accident did not derail their plans for a new generation of nuclear stations in the UK.

Cataract treatment thresholds branded ‘false economy’ – Optomentry.co.uk 30/06/11
Arbitrary thresholds for cataract treatment being brought in by some PCTs are ‘false economy’ and are reducing the quality of life for the elderly in England, an RNIB report has concluded. Following a Freedom of Information Act request to all English PCTs, the charity has found that 53% of those who responded had an acuity threshold in place for treatment which goes against Department of Health guidance. Read the report here.

Police cash in on car crashes: It’s not just insurance forms making millions selling drivers’ details – 28/06/11 Claims Standards Council
Police are raking in millions of pounds from a ‘huge racket’ in which they cynically sell on the details of drivers who have had a road accident. The police demand a so-called ‘administration fee’ of up to £25 per vehicle. The evidence was compiled by the insurer swiftcover.com, using Freedom of Information requests.

UK Information Commissioner orders release of climate data – Nature 28/06/11
Nearly two years after an Oxford University professor filed the original freedom-of-information request, the United Kingdom Information Commissioner's Office has overruled the University of East Anglia and ordered the institution to release a pair of files containing weather station data.

Spending on older people’s care to be cut by 8.4 per cent this year reveals new Age UK research – Age UK 27/06/11
Age UK research launched today reveals that the likely cuts in older people’s social care of 8.4 per cent this year could hasten the collapse of an already crumbling social care system in England. Age UK made a Freedom of Information request to each English council with responsibility for adult social services, to reveal their planned expenditure on older people’s social care for the current financial year.

Memo reveals intelligence chief’s bid to fuel fears of Iraqi WMDs – The Observer 26/06/11
The senior intelligence official responsible for Tony Blair's notorious dossier on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction proposed using the document to mislead the public about the significance of Iraq's banned weapons. The memo, released under the Freedom of Information Act, has been described as one of the most significant documents on the dossier yet published.

Inspections reveal poor standards of care at homes for the elderly – The Scotsman 26/06/11
One in ten of Scotland's homes for the elderly are providing either "weak" or "unsatisfactory" care for residents, according to worrying new figures obtained by Labour from a freedom of information request.

Secret memorandum reveals Britain’s involvement in rendition – The Guardian 23/06/11
A secret memorandum of understanding between the UK and US on the treatment of prisoners captured in Iraq has been released for the first time. The 2008 document is one of a series of documents revealed through freedom of information requests put in by the all-party parliamentary group on extraordinary rendition. Read the MOU here.

An end to the ‘status quo of secrecy’ at Bolton Council? – Bolton News 19/06/11
The outside business dealings of senior town hall staff could soon be made public after Bolton Council was issued a High Court threat by the country’s information boss. The threat comes after transparency campaigner John Greenwood asked for details held on the council’s register of interests in a request under the Freedom of Information Act. The Information Commissioner has now ruled that the details of the register of interests should be released.

FOI Disclosure Stories May 26th- June 13th

Thousands of children held in police cells overnight – Guardian 13/06/11
At least 53,000 children under the age of 16 were held overnight in police cells in 2008 and 2009, including 13,000 children aged between nine and 13, according to figures obtained by the Howard League for Penal Reform from half the police forces in England and Wales.

Foreigners pay £1m for NHS liver operations – The Sunday Times 12/06/11 (subscription only)
A hospital in the National Health Service has been paid more than £1m in the past two years for carrying out private liver transplants on foreigners using scarce organs donated by British patients. King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, in London, was paid £1,082,064 for 22 private liver transplants on foreign patients between January 2009 and February 2011, according to figures obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.

Vulnerable pupils are most likely to suffer expulsion – Your Ashford 12/06/11
Figures released under the Freedom of Information Act reveal that of 168 secondary school youngsters who were permanently excluded in the county of Kent last year, more than half had been assessed as needing close attention due to learning problems such as autism and dyslexia.

MoD Report Sparks Nuke Safety Fear – The Sunday Post 12/06/11 (subscription only)
A damning MoD report has said the future safety of the UK’s nuclear defence programme is being jeopardised by spending cuts. The report by the MoD's internal watchdog the Defence Nuclear Environment Safety Board was released under Freedom of Information. Read the article in The Herald.

No home to call their own – Inside Housing 10/06/11
The number of homeless households in England is set to jump dramatically this week as councils publish their official figures. Freedom of information requests by Inside Housing, which obtained the figures ahead of their expected publication on Thursday, reveal that 37 out of the 51 councils who provided figures for 2010/11 saw homelessness increase.

More than 70 per cent of NHS trusts break rules to deny IMF – and save money – The Independent 07/06/11
Women unable to conceive naturally are being denied IVF on the NHS because they are too young, too old, too fat, smoke or live in Wales – in flagrant breaches of the guidelines. The information was disclosed after the All Party Parliamentary Group on Infertility sent Freedom of Information requests to all 177 PCTs in England and Wales in March and received 171 replies.

Architects net £98m from schools – The Sunday Times 05/06/11 (subscription only)
Architects have claimed nearly £100m in fees from just 21 councils under Labour’s multi-billion-pound school-building programme, newly disclosed figures show. The architects’ fees were revealed after a freedom of information request by the Conservative party. Read the story on the Conservatives website.

HMRC launched 9,368 investigations into inheritance tax valuations over the last year – UHY Hacker Young 06/06/11
HMRC collected £70 million of additional tax by challenging the valuations of properties included in the estate of a deceased person in 2010. A freedom of information request obtained by accountants UHY Hacker Young has revealed that HMRC examined 9,368 inheritance tax valuations over the last year and has raised an average of £24,000 per case in additional tax.

Did sports club members jump the housing queue? – This is Nottingham 02/06/11
An investigation by the Post has revealed that some members of a city sports club may have received preferential treatment in the allocation of council houses. Using leaked housing records and requests under the Freedom of Information Act, the Post has identified eight players and their families who received offers for a total of 18 properties during two-and-a-half years from late 2002 to 2005.

Shock figures that spell out the extent of London’s reading crisis – The Standard 01/06/11
Data obtained by the Standard show as many as one in three children in parts of the capital lags behind - far worse than was first feared. The figures reveal the extent of the literacy crisis in London, with many state schools failing to give children the most basic of life skills. The statistics, uncovered after a five-month freedom of information battle, led parents and experts to call on the Government to tackle the scandal.

Trafficked children condemned to a nightmare by state neglect – The Observer 28/05/11
Thousands of trafficked children are being abused and murdered by their captors, but UK officials remain indifferent and skeptical. A freedom of information request revealed that 173 unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, all vulnerable to traffickers, went missing from Kent council's care homes in 2009.

Trust me, Cable tells arms trade, I sold weapons to Latin America – The Times 30/05/11 (subscription only)
Vince Cable’s days as a young diplomat were spent as an arms broker helping to sell British-made weapons to one of the world’s most unstable regions. In a private speech to a symposium of arms exporters in London last November, a copy of which has been obtained by The Times under the Freedom of Information Act, Dr Cable set about calming nerves among the industry that his past stance against arms exports would make him queasy about fighting their cause abroad.

Councils spend £100m on taxpayer funded credit cards – The Telegraph 31/05/11
Councils have spent tens of millions of pounds on taxpayer-funded credit cards with local authority executives and councillors treating themselves to first-class travel to foreign destinations and stays in five-star hotels. The Daily Telegraph has obtained details of credit card spending at 186 councils across Britain using Freedom of Information laws.

UK trained Bahraini army officers even after crackdown began – The Independent 30/05/11
Britain continued to train Bahraini army officers at Sandhurst months after the Gulf state began its brutal crackdown against pro-democracy demonstrators, it was disclosed yesterday. Five Bahraini officers were receiving tuition at the élite military academy in Surrey as recently as last month, a Freedom of Information request has revealed.

UK training Saudi forces used to crush Arab spring – The Observer 28/05/11
Britain is training Saudi Arabia's national guard – the elite security force deployed during the recent protests in Bahrain – in public order enforcement measures and the use of sniper rifles. In response to questions made under the Freedom of Information Act, the Ministry of Defence has confirmed that British personnel regularly run courses for the national guard in "weapons, fieldcraft and general military skills training, as well as incident handling, bomb disposal, search, public order and sniper training".

Waste Watch: Councils Spend Millions On Away Days – 26/05/11
A Sky News Waste Watch investigation reveals local authorities spent more than £2 million on away days over the last two years, as Britain plunged into recession. Using Freedom of Information legislation, Waste Watch contacted every council in Britain for details of spending on team-building trips, away days and 'brainstorming' sessions.

Campaign for Freedom of Information responds to comments on science and FOI

Letter
The Guardian, Friday 27 May 2011

The president of the Royal Society calls for changes to freedom of information laws to prevent them being misused (Data laws 'misused' in climate change row, 26 May). However, existing safeguards address many of his concerns. Deliberate attempts to "intimidate" scientists, if that is what they are, can be refused under the Freedom of Information Act's safeguards against vexatious requests. Unreasonable requests for all pre-publication drafts of scientific papers can be refused under an exemption for information due for future publication. Explanations of why changes to successive drafts were made do not have to be provided unless they exist in writing. Multiple related requests from different people, if they are co-ordinated, can be refused if the combined cost of answering exceeds the act's cost limit.

Another academic is quoted as saying many FoI requests are made in order to find problems and errors – but that is a valid use of the act. It was the misguided attempt to deny ammunition to critics that led to the Climategate fiasco. The resulting independent review found there had been an "ethos of minimal compliance (and at times non-compliance) … with both the letter and the spirit" of the legislation, and that the campaign of requests to the UEA climatic research unit was partly the result of its own "unhelpful" response to earlier requests. It is not clear that much has changed.

Maurice Frankel
Director, Campaign for Freedom of Information

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2011/may/27/scientists-freedom-information-law-safeguards

FOI Disclosure Stories May 2011

Internal report reveals fear of sudden ruinous rise in oil prices – The Times 24/05/11 (subscription only)
A sudden huge increase in oil prices would cut more than £102 billion from the economy over the next five years, wrecking Britain’s economic recovery, increasing unemployment and provoking industrial action, according to a Department for Energy and Climate Change report obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.

Empty homes to be demolished ‘hidden from figures’ – BBC 23/05/11
Around 12,000 empty homes are hidden from official figures because they are earmarked for demolition, according to The Empty Homes Agency, which discovered the numbers using a freedom of information request.

Welsh schools’ GCSE performances revealed – BBC Wales 23/05/11
The Welsh Government places schools in "families" - groups of about 10 - where pupils have similar levels of family income and special needs. In one case a school's results are 42% better than another in the same family. The details were obtained by BBC Wales under the Freedom of Information Act.

Sharp drop in risk assessments into financial firms – The Guardian 22/05/11
The number of risk assessments into financial firms has fallen dramatically since the banking crisis in 2008. In response to a Freedom of Information Act request, the FSA revealed 936 risk assessments took place in 2002, with 616 in 2004 and 427 in 2006. The number then stabilised around 300 until 2008 when it fell to just over 200.

Radiotherapy centre was regarded as one of the five ‘highest priority projects’ – The Londonderry Sentinel 13/05/11
Documents obtained through FOI show that the move towards halting plans to proceed with a badly-needed radiotherapy centre at Altnagelvin Hospital came just hours after it was described as one of the Department of Health’s highest priorities. The Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety released various drafts of the controversial statement made by then Health Minister Michael McGimpsey on the last day of the Assembly.

NDCS map shows local authorities failing to protect deaf children’s services – National
Deaf Children’s Society 10/05/11
Figures released by the National Deaf Children’s Society (NDCS) reveal that almost one in five local authorities across England have cut education services for vulnerable deaf children, despite the education budget being protected by the Government. NDCS had to issue 45 Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to obtain the data.

Extent of sexual offences by police being concealed by resignations – The Times 10/05/11 (subscription only)
More than 300 police officers have been disciplined for sexual offences in the past five years, The Times can reveal. Almost a hundred faced sexual assault charges, and 231 misconduct hearings for sexual misconduct, with about a third of the officers dismissed or required to resign. All 52 police forces responded to a freedom of information request for data about sexual wrongdoing by officers, with the exception of Warwickshire.

Birmingham children’s care homes and the £41million scandal – Birmingham Mail 09/05/11
The cost of placing troubled children from Birmingham in private care has rocketed after council chiefs closed four kids’ homes in the city. The information was released to the Birmingham Mail under Freedom of Information laws. The revelation that children from the city are being sent to centres up to 470 miles away in Scotland, as well as East Sussex and County Durham, has been described as a “scandal”.

Hundreds of police sacked in secret hearings – The Times 09/05/11
Police forces are sacking 160 officers every year after misconduct hearings held behind closed doors, an investigation by The Times has discovered. The Times made freedom of information requests to all 52 local forces across Britain. The results uncovered a disciplinary lottery, with officers being fired in one area for offences that might attract only a fine in another.

Councils accused of blocking renewable energy roll out - Renewable Energy Installer 05/05/11
Government plans to support the roll out of a renewable energy network are being hampered by confusion and a shocking level of inconsistency at the local level, a new survey has found. Despite government legislation to scrap the need for planning permission, many councils are still insisting homeowners seek their consent before installing solar panels according to FOI requests submitted by Renewable Energy Installer magazine.

1 in 4 not in council pension – GMB Union 03/05/11
One in four council workers have already opted out of local government pension schemes showing proposed contribution increases to local government pension schemes from 3.2% to 9.6% would be a disaster, and could jeopardise the entire Local Government Pension Scheme for its four million members says GMB. GMB established that data on participation rates in the current Local Government pension scheme using the Freedom of Information Act.

Alok Sharma MP: How Council Tax payers have funded £35 million of Trade Union salaries over the past three years – Conservative Home 28/04/11
In order to find out just how widespread the practice of funding full-time union officials with tax payers’ money was, FOI requests were sent to 429 councils across the country. Out of the 319 councils that responded, 132 had a paid full-time union official in at least one of the last 3 years. The total salary bill over the three year period for full-time union reps was £35 million.

FOI Disclosure Stories April 19th-May 4th

£7 million spent on Birmingham Prison ahead of controversial takeover – Birmingham Mail 03/05/11
Taxpayers have shelled out more than £7 million during the past five years on improvements at Birmingham Prison – even though it will be taken over in less than six months by a private security firm. A Freedom of Information request revealed more than £2 million had been spent during the first three months of this year alone.

£310k of City Council schemes are waved through – The Sentinel 03/05/11
Council officers applied to have more than £1.5 million worth of contracts approved without going through a tendering process designed to secure best value for money. They applied for exemption certificates for 12 projects which meant they did not have to go through a protracted procedure. Information, obtained by The Sentinel under the Freedom of Information Act, showed that six of these projects went ahead costing £30, 915.

Care Quality Commission visits drop by 70% - Community Care 03/05/11
Adult care providers have seen a "frightening and unacceptable" 70% drop in inspections by the Care Quality Commission in the past year, prompting fears for the welfare of service users. The sharp fall, revealed in a Freedom of Information request by Community Care, follows the introduction of the CQC's new registration system for providers last October, and comes despite the regulator saying that it expected there to be more inspections under the new regime.

Top Kent schools get millions in funding meant for deprived inner city pupils – Your Thanet 30/04/11
More than £4.5 million a year of Government funding is being "unfairly" pumped into selected schools to spend as they wish through a project abolished five years ago. And despite the grants being designed specifically to help schools in deprived urban areas, many of those in Kent receiving the no-strings-attached cash are in affluent areas or are grammar schools according to figures obtained through a Freedom of Information request.

GPs challenge PCT rationing plans - GP 28/04/11
PCT restrictions on access to NHS treatment has led to a huge rise in GPs having to submit requests for patients to access care, GP has found. The number of such requests rose by 17 per cent from 2008/9 (53,000) to 2010/11 (62,000), according to responses from 103 PCTs to our request under the Freedom of Information Act. Over the same period, the proportion of requests approved fell by 22 per cent.

Trusts insist on local GPs in out-of-hours overhaul – Pulse 28/04/11
GP out-of-hours care is being radically reshaped across England, with PCTs working with consortia to implement 'local doctor only' policies or merging services with the Government’s new 111 urgent care number.75 PCTs are following the lead of NHS East of England according to responses under the Freedom of Information Act.

Syrian officers received training in Britain – The Guardian 27/04/11
The British government has defended its training programme for foreign military leaders after it emerged that it had educated several Syrian officers at Ministry of Defence colleges. The data was released following a freedom of information request by the Guardian.

Britain for Sale – Property Week 21/04/11
A never-before-seen list of government property that is on the market, including a derelict hospital on London's Hampstead Road, a Yorkshire golf club and a grade II-listed office building in Cheltenham, was obtained from by the Government Property Unit through a Freedom of Information Act request. See a map of all the properties here.

Secret memos expose link between oil firms and invasion of Iraq - The Independent 19/04/11
Plans to exploit Iraq's oil reserves were discussed by government ministers and the world's largest oil companies the year before Britain took a leading role in invading Iraq, government documents show. Over 1,000 documents were obtained under Freedom of Information over five years by the oil campaigner Greg Muttitt.

Closures of youth prisons triggered cases of unrest – Children & Young People Now 19/04/11
The closure of young offender institutions (YOIs) has created serious safeguarding issues within the secure estate, CYP Now has learned. A YJB document dating back to last September, released to CYP Now under the Freedom of Information Act, revealed that "recent decommissioning of estate appears to have been a relevant factor in two recent significant incidents".


GPs set for greater powers to combat acute trust overspends – Pulse 18/04/11
The Department of Health is poised to add more levers into acute trust contracts to give GPs greater negotiating powers with hospitals, says a senior Department of Health official. It comes as information obtained by Pulse under the Freedom of Information Act revealed the extent of acute overspending that GP commissioners will have to tackle.

Emails expose BP’s attempts to control research into impact of Gulf oil spill – The Guardian 15/04/11
BP officials tried to take control of a $500m fund pledged by the oil company for independent research into the consequences of the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster, it has emerged. Documents obtained under the US Freedom of Information Act show BP officials openly discussing how to influence the work of scientists supported by the fund, which was created by the oil company in May last year.

FOI Disclosure Stories March 27th-April 13th

GPs face bans on high-cost drugs – Pulse 12/04/11
GPs are being banned from prescribing high-cost drugs approved by NICE as NHS managers seek drastic savings on prescribing budgets. Responses from 134 PCOs under the Freedom of Information Act show that more than half have blacklists of drugs – in some trusts of more than 100 – that GPs are banned from prescribing.

Musa Kusa linked to lawyer’s killing in London – The Times 10/04/11 (subscription only)
Former Libyan foreign minister was linked to the murder of a Libyan lawyer in London, according to a previously unseen police report. The revelation, in documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, comes amid mounting pressure on the government to prosecute Kusa.

Britain Privatises war-zone intelligence… at a cost of £240m – The Times 08/04/11 (subscription only)
Intelligence in Afghanistan is being gathered by security companies as the contracting-out of military duties becomes much more commonplace. MPs are now examining the growing scope of the contracts, obtained by The Times under the Freedom of Information Act.

Salmon & Trout Association exposes sham of salmon farming industry claims – Salmon & Trout Association 07/04/11
Dossier of material obtained under freedom of information reveals alarming results of Government inspections of Scottish salmon farms including high levels of sea-lice - the major concern for wild fish conservation.

NHS missing out on £5.5m a year in potential savings – Royal College of Nursing 06/04/11
The Royal College of Nursing has revealed that the NHS could potentially save up to £5.5 million a year if health organisations improve the way they dispose of waste. The RCN submitted a Freedom of Information to investigate and subsequently produced a report, Freedom of Information report on waste management. Read the report here.

Rarer Cancers Foundation Report warns of growing cross-border divide in cancer services – Rarer Cancers Foundation 06/04/11
A new RCF report has found that patients in Wales are being denied life-extending cancer treatments which would be made available to them elsewhere in the UK. The figures have come to light under Freedom of Information requests.

Surgery blunders hospital tightens checks – Yorkshire Post 04/04/11
A hospital trust in Yorkshire has paid out a total of almost £1.2m in compensation to women who were left in pain and in some cases scarred for life after their breast operations were botched by the same surgeon. New figures obtained under FOI reveal that a total of £1,189,054 has been paid by the Foundation Trust to 26 women.

Met hacking inquiry chief dined with NOTW staff – The Independent 01/04/11
The police chief who headed Scotland Yard’s inquiry into phone-hacking dined with the News of the World at the height of his criminal investigation into the newspaper. Its disclosure in a Freedom of Information request prompted claims that the force had an unduly “cosy relationship” with News International.


Labour claims police officers will be forced to retire – BBC 29/03/11
Although police officers cannot be made redundant, officers with 30 or more years' experience can be made to retire under existing regulations. Labour said details obtained under Freedom of Information showed 13 forces definitely intended to use this power and that 1,138 officers either have or will be forced to retire by 2015.


MoD pays £1.3m compensation to Afghans for death, injury and damage – The Guardian 28/03/11
Ministry of Defence payouts include £542 for a girl killed in a fire and £4,700 for a shop destroyed by a flare. The list of all claims that were settled or rejected in 2010 has been released after the Guardian made a freedom of information request to the MoD. Read the full list here.

‘This is damning evidence of the dangers of handing control of public services to private firms’ – The Herald 27/03/11
A massive £4.8 billion of public money is being paid to multinational corporations to run water-works that are plagued with breakdowns and pollution. Details of the problems are disclosed in hundreds of internal documents released by Scottish Water to an industry researcher at Strathclyde University under FOI laws.

Foreign Office ‘backed BP in Rosneft talks’ – The Sunday Telegraph 27/03/11
Efforts by BP to hammer out its $16bn (£10bn) share swap and Arctic exploration deal with Russian energy group Rosneft had the full support of the Foreign Office. A series of meetings between the British ambassador in Moscow and BP executives covering discussions about a Rosneft tie are listed in censored cables released under the Freedom of Information Act.

FOI Disclosure Stories March 13-24

Patients died following delay in treatment – Lancashire Evening Post 23/03/11
In one incident, ambulance crew lost a patient for almost five hours while transporting them to hospital. The patient was found in the vehicle in the ambulance station garage at midnight. The findings were revealed by the North West Ambulance Service, following a Freedom of Information request about the number of Serious Untoward Incidents (SUIs) recorded.

GP reforms’ leaders on boards of private firms – Pulse 23/03/11
One GP in 10 on the boards of new commissioning consortia also holds an executive-level position with a private provider, exposing the serious potential for conflict of interest in the Government’s NHS reforms according to data released by PCTs under the Freedom of Information Act.

Doctor 'enraged' by £3.5m bill for consultants over 30 months - The Sentinel 23/03/11
A GP has clashed with leaders of a health trust after revealing they spent £3.5 million on private consultancy fees in 30 months. Dr Sunil Angris told North Staffordshie Primary Care Turst directors that fellow doctors and healthcare professionals were "shocked, alarmed and enraged" by the sum, which he obtained using a Freedom of Information request.

Royal Mail send 25 million items a year to the shredder - Daily Mail 21/03/11
Royal Mail has admitted it destroys an average 25 million letters, packets and parcels every year. The company has destroyed 152 million items of post that could not be delivered or returned to sender in the last six years, according to figures obtained following a Freedom of Information request.

Haringey Young People's Counselling Service axed by Haringey Council - Haringey Independent 17/03/11
A counselling service for young people will close in two weeks as a result of budget cuts, Haringey Council has confirmed. The Haringey Young People's Counselling Service provides one-on-one therapy to vulnerable teenagers, but will be axed after the council cut the youth services budget by 75 per cent. This was revealed in a freedom of information request by members of pressure group Save Haringey Youth Service.

Neurology 'lottery' as costs vary 10-fold - Pulse 16/03/11
GP commissioning consortia will inherit an ‘idiosyncratic’ postcode lottery for neurology services from PCTs. Information obtained under the Freedom of Information Act suggests the price trusts were paying for new consultant outpatient appointments for neurology in 2009 varied from £67 to £592.

English football's tax debt was £22m 'at low eb' in 2010 - Sporting Intelligence 15/03/11
Clubs from the Premier League owe millions of pounds in tax payments, including VAT, despite being rich enough to pay player’s salaries that run into six figures per week in some cases, according to findings from a Freedom of Information inquiry.

Green spaces sell-off? Bristol City Council has no plan B - Bristol Evening Post 15/03/11
Bristol City Council has never looked at ways of paying for the £87 million parks improvement plan that didn't involve selling off green spaces. The council has repeatedly stated a plan based around developers' money would not be enough. But following a request under the Freedom of Information Act, the authority has been forced to admit it has never actually looked at the detail of such a plan.

Pledges to protect ‘frontline’ officers worthless because no definition exists – Western Morning News 15/03/11
Freedom of Information Act requests have confirmed that neither the Home Office, or Devon and Cornwall Police, actually know what a "frontline"officer is. Neither said theyhad definitions for the role, although the Home Office said it was under "consideration".

Troubles team is accused of bias – Newsletter 15/03/11
A recent freedom of information release has revealed that all but one of the 71 Historical Enquiries Team arrests have been loyalists, leading the Lagan Valley MLA to warn of “considerable unrest” if the continuing peace process “does not recognise that the majority of killings were carried out by the Provisional IRA”.

Travel insurers cash in on NHS - The Sunday Times 13/03/11
Travel insurers that pay out on medical claims have pocketed nearly £4.8m from the NHS since 2005. The figures were released following a Freedom of Information request by The Sunday Times.

FOI Disclosure Stories Feb 23rd-March 10th

New Rarer Cancers Foundation report finds that hundreds of Scottish cancer patients have been refused treatment – 09/03/11 Rarer Cancers Foundation
The report found that 360 patients have been denied access to life-extending cancer treatment in Scotland over the past three years and that nearly 2,500 patients have been forced to rely on exceptional case committees in order to secure access to the treatment recommended by their doctors. Figures were obtained under the Freedom of Information Act from Scotland’s 14 NHS boards. See the report: The Scottish Exception? An audit of the progress made in improving access to treatment for people with rarer cancers

Councils could face legal challenges over job cuts says UNISON – UNISON 08/03/11
On the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day, UNISON is warning that councils could face legal challenges over job cuts on equality grounds. An FOI request by the union reveals that 72% of councils did not complete equality impact assessments (EIA) over their initial redundancy proposals and 78% of councils did not complete EIAs on their final job loss plans.

Police forces cut thousands of hours in overtime – The Times 08/03/11 (subscription only)
Police forces across the country are cutting tens of thousands of hours in overtime, an investigation by The Times has found, as they battle to reduce their spending as budget cuts start to bite. The figures, obtained from a Freedom of Information request, come as the Government considers plans to cut millions from the police pay bill.

West Midlands planning money remains ‘unspent’ – BBC 07/02/11
Almost £70m of planning "gain" money remains unspent by councils in the West Midlands. Freedom of Information requests to all councils across the region revealed some of them had not spent money given to them by developers.

Hospitals’ cockroach kitchens – The Sunday Times 06/03/11 (subscription only)
Three out of four hospital kitchens in Britain have breached basic food hygiene standards, a damning investigation by The Sunday Times can reveal. Fewer than 200 hospital kitchens were given a clean bill of health in the inspection reports obtained under freedom of information rules.

Private Security Firms paid £29m last year for contracts in Afghanistan – The Guardian 06/03/11
New figures, released under the Freedom of Information Act, confirm that a growing reliance on private firms is underpinning Britain's war effort.

Email Trail as England 2018 bid eyed royal ties with Qatar – BBC 05/03/11
The confidential emails on England’s World Cup bid obtained under freedom of information requests by the BBC contain fascinating insights into the sorts of deals and discussions that were going on in the run-up to last year’s vote in Zurich. See the emails in full here.

Postcode lottery for care fees of neediest – Which? 05/03/11
Those with the highest, most complex health needs are supposed to have their full care costs funded by the NHS, whatever their financial situation. But Which? research has discovered there are huge variations in care funding across the country. Using Freedom of Information requests and analysing government data, we found that 8 times as many people per 50,000 in Plymouth receive funding than in Essex.

Ofsted forced to reveal survey findings – TES 04/03/11
Ofsted has released the results of staff and student surveys carried out during an inspection for the first time. Despite publishing the data for one school following a teacher's request under the Freedom of Information Act, the watchdog says that it has no plans to make the survey results available routinely.

GPs are accused of using profits from commissioning to meet practice expenses – Health Service Journal (subscription only) reported in the BMJ 04/03/11
GPs have been accused of lining their own pockets by using the savings made from practice based commissioning to provide basic practice equipment. Freedom of Information requests revealed examples amounting to several millions of pounds among 50 primary care trusts, covering 650 general practices.

Centre for Sustainable Energy publishes full UK public building energy data – Centre for Sustainable Energy 02/03/11
CSE has published the full Display Energy Certificate (DEC) Register for all UK public buildings, making it publicly available in one place for the first time. The dataset includes the address, floorspace, heat and power consumption, carbon emissions, and energy efficiency rating of 40,000 sites. We obtained the data from the Department for Communities and Local Government (CLG) under the Environmental Information Regulations.

Savings pressures mount on staff terms and conditions – Health Service Journal (subscription only) reported on Nursing Times 02/03/11
Documents, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, show these cuts include £1.5m potential savings from freezing pay increments and £1m from decreasing annual leave by two-five days. Around £400,000 could also be saved from treating a bank holiday as a working day and a further £600,000 from reducing sickness entitlement.

The top 100 government suppliers – The Guardian 02/03/11
SA Mathieson used Freedom of Information requests as a way to gather information on government spending. All the 15 departments and organisations that were approached provided a list of their 100 largest suppliers.

PCTs slash GP out-of-hours spending – GP Online 03/03/11
A quarter of PCTs have cut spending on GP out-of-hours services since last year, a GP investigation reveals. Data obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show 20 PCTs forecast savings of around £4 million in total on out-of-hours in 2010/11 compared with 2009/10 spending.

Leicester Mercury wins battle to learn facts about ex-MPs’ cash payouts – Leicester Mercury 26/02/11
The Leicester Mercury has won a victory that will force the House of Commons to reveal whether former MPs took "golden goodbye" payments worth up to £60,000. Using the Freedom of Information Act, the Commons authorities were asked to provide a list of MPs who had drawn the grant, paid out of public funds.

Volunteers uncover £50 million in corporate funds to UK universities – Corporate Watch 24/02/11
People & Planet uncover £50 million from oil, arms and big pharma being channelled into UK universities. The Reclaim Research group conducted interviews and sent Freedom of Information requests to 17 universities and are starting to reveal the hidden connections between research and corporations at universities.

Britain ‘gave Gadaffi’ police firearms training – The Times (subscription only) 23/02/11
A three-week “command and control” course for senior officers took place in Tripoli in January 2009, which included “use of force and human rights, introduction to the conflict management model and command of spontaneous firearms operations”, according to documents released under the Freedom of Information Act.

FOI Disclosure Stories February 2011

Exclusive: 50,000 job losses uncovered by False Economy - False Economy 23/02/11
False Economy can reveal that more than 50,000 NHS staff posts are set for the axe, destroying government claims that the NHS is in safe hands. Our figures have been collated for the most part from the NHS trusts themselves under the Freedom of Information Act.

Radical new gateways reject one in eight GP referrals - Pulse 23/2/11
GP practices are seeing as many as one in eight of their referrals diverted or rejected, under radical new 'total referral management' schemes, a Pulse investigation reveals.

Pickles Under Fire From Tory-Led Councils – Sky News 22/02/11
Conservative-led councils have warned Communities Secretary Eric Pickles that "unfair" spending cuts will have "potentially devastating" consequences. The correspondence, released to Sky News under the Freedom of Information Act, lays bare the depth of frustration felt by local authorities.

Rise in teen pregnancy feared as roles are axed - Children & Young People Now 22/02/11
Teenage pregnancy co-ordinators across the country face job losses after many councils revealed they cannot afford to fund the role. Freedom of information requests sent to all local authorities in England have revealed that 50 out of the 86 councils that currently employ teenage pregnancy co-ordinators cannot commit to funding the posts for 2011/2012.

Lives put at risk as hospitals fail to fix safety problems – The Telegraph 21/02/11
Half of the 406 NHS trusts in England are failing to comply with safety alerts, which cover everything from equipment failure to warnings on correct dosage, according to the charity Action against Medical Accidents.

Councils ‘missed’ £530m in taxes – BBC 18/02/11
Cash-strapped local authorities in England, Scotland and Wales failed to collect £530m in council tax in 2009-2010, a BBC investigation found. The figures were obtained through a Freedom of Information request.

Taxpayers paid £50m a year for non-existent operations – The Telegraph 15/02/11
Under controversial minimum payment contracts, 25 independent sector treatment centres across England were paid a set amount, regardless of how many operations they actually carried out.

The Mystery of England’s 12,000 Vanishing Pupils – TES 11/02/11
Almost 12,000 children are officially "missing" from education, a TES investigation has revealed, with many at "serious risk" of physical, sexual and mental harm.

Racism on the Rise in Scotland – STV 11/02/11
Statistics revealed in a freedom of information request to Scotland's eight police forces showed that 6,171 incidents of racism were recorded in 2009/10 - a 20% increase in racist incidents over the past 12 months.

Danish pastries all round, advises handbook for first-time ministers – The Independent 06/02/11
Some of the most powerful politicians in the UK have been presented with an "idiots' guide" on how to run the country. The manual is one of 23 ministerial training documents obtained under Freedom of Information legislation.

Over half of all VAT decisions issued by HMRC found incorrect on appeal – UHY Hacker Young Chartered Accountants 24/01/11
Data obtained under the Freedom of Information Act shows that over the last 18 months HMRC completed 28,912 reviews of technical decisions and VAT penalties imposed on businesses, of which 16,270 were subsequently ruled incorrect.

FOI Disclosure Stories November 1st-18th

8,000 vulnerable children denied social workers – communitycare.co.uk 17/11/10
Councils have failed to allocate social workers to more than 8,000 vulnerable children across the country, a Community Care investigation revealed after making a Freedom of Information request.

27,000 NHS jobs to go, says Royal College of Nursing – The Telegraph 12/11/10
Almost 27,000 NHS jobs could go in cuts across hospitals and other acute services, according to the Royal College of Nursing which compiled information from board meeting papers and Freedom of Information requests.
Read the Royal College of Nursing report


£720k a year: Camden’s bill for housing 20 families - Hampstead & Highgate Express 9/11/10
One family, the highest claimant of housing benefit in Camden, receives a massive £6,565 a month – the equivalent of £78,780 a year, figures released under the Freedom of Information Act state.

Don't knock our flats down, they're all safe, say Bristol residents - Bristol Evening Post 03/11/10
Residents campaigning to save homes earmarked for demolition say councillors have been making decisions based on false statements according to official council documents obtained stating that the properties are structurally sound and can be refurbished.

Chocfinger’s Tory donation pays off – The Sunday Times 31/10/10
The secretary of state for international development intervened to help a cocoa trader beat sanctions for smuggling in Ghana according to internal documents released under Freedom of Information.

FOI Disclosure Stories Oct 2010

Michael Gove's ex-adviser given £500,000 free schools grant - The Guardian 28/10/2010
Pro-free schools lobby group run by Gove’s 25-year-old ex-advisor won project work – which was not advertised – to offer impartial advice on the proposals, FOI request reveals.

How the state failed to protect vulnerable children - Belfast Telegraph 27/10/2010
The summaries of four confidential Case Management Reviews on the deaths of vulnerable children in Northern Ireland highlight raise concerns about how their cases were dealt with by social services and other agencies.

British forces exposed over Afghan attacks – The Guardian 27/10/2010
Ministry of Defence releases documents linking three military units to bulk of civilian casualties.

Liberty challenges immigration detention of children - Morning Star 26/10/2010
A landmark case challenging the government's continued detention of children was launched at the High Court in London. Liberty obtained information under the Freedom of Information Act showing that in 2009 alone, 1065 children were held in immigration detention.

40 deaths linked to child vaccines over seven years – The Sunday Times 24/10/10
Data, disclosed by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Authority (MHRA) under the Freedom of Information Act, shows that, since 2003, there have been more than 2,100 serious adverse reactions to childhood vaccines, some of which were life-threatening.

MoD papers reveal catalogue of nuclear safety failures – The Herald 17/10/10
Potentially catastrophic lapses in nuclear weapons safety at the Clyde naval base have been exposed by secret Ministry of Defence reports released after a three-year freedom of information battle.

Porton Down film shows Cold War plague tests on animals – BBC 10/10/2010
An amateur historian uncovered a top secret film from the 1950's showing testing of a biological bomb on animals by scientists from Porton Down in Wiltshire.

London 2012: A Rubbish Olympics - Games Monitor 26/09/2010
A campaign group watching the Olympic Games in London has produced a detailed report of the radioactive waste contamination on the Olympics Site based on documents disclosed under the FOI act.

FOI Disclosure Stories March 2010

Extraordinary details of the Queen's finances revealed - The Independent 31/03/10

“Details concerning the mounting financial crisis facing the Queen have been disclosed to The Independent after ministers agreed to hand over secret correspondence between Buckingham Palace and the Government. The documents reveal that at the same time the Queen was requesting more public money to pay for the upkeep of her crumbling palaces she was allowing minor royals and courtiers to live in rent-free accommodation. They show that as early as 2004 Sir Alan Reid, the Keeper of the Privy Purse, had unsuccessfully put the case to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) for a substantial increase in the £15m a year public funding.“

Paramedic 'morphine errors' investigated - BBC 30/03/10

"A woman died and another became seriously ill soon after being given morphine by paramedics, despite family members warning of the patients' allergies to the drug. The incidents were revealed in documents obtained by the BBC under the Freedom of Information Act and are understood to have taken place in Cambridgeshire within months of each other."

Drugs and desertion: how the UK really rates Afghan police- The Independent 28/03/10

“Ghost recruits and widespread corruption are hampering the fight against the Taliban and delaying Britain's withdrawal plans. Corruption, desertion and drug abuse within the Afghan police are threatening its ability to take over the fight against the Taliban and the UK's chances of an exit from the country, government documents show.”

NHS porters and cleaners can snoop on your medical records- Daily Mail 26/03/10

“As many as 140,000 non-medical staff, including porters and housekeepers, have access to sensitive NHS patient files, it emerged last night. The astonishing lack of privacy protection has been revealed by a Freedom of Information survey. Government guidelines say only staff involved in 'providing and supporting patient care' should have access to confidential information. But trusts are interpreting the rules so widely that administrators, porters and IT staff are all cleared to potentially delve into a person's medical file. Last night Tory spokesman Stephen O'Brien said the revelation would 'send a shiver down the spine' of NHS patients. The Information Commissioner's office said access to records should be strictly controlled and it would study the revelations to see if further action was needed.”

Gagging law to protect Prince Charles- The Times 21/03/10

“The government is trying to change the law to protect the Prince of Wales from scrutiny when he intervenes in public affairs. Jack Straw, the justice secretary, has tabled an amendment to the Constitutional Reform and Governance Bill to impose a blanket ban on anyone disclosing information about Prince Charles, the Queen and Prince William. The move comes after a freedom of information (FoI) application revealed how Charles scuppered a £3 billion redevelopment of Chelsea Barracks. The property developers Christian and Nick Candy discovered that his aide met planning officials to discuss scrapping the scheme.”

PCTs may have diverted dementia services funding, MPs warn- Health Care Republic 18/03/10

"PCTs may have diverted a large proportion of £150m in funding for dementia services to other priorities, an investigation by MPs has found. More than two thirds of PCTs were unable to say how they spent their share of cash allocated under the National Dementia Strategy for England, a report published on Thursday reveals. Responding to a freedom of information request by the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on dementia, just 31% of PCTs said how they had allocated their share of the £150m funds. The same percentage of PCTs could not determine how much of the funding had been spent on dementia services because they could not distinguish the funding from other resources. The report, ‘A Misspent Opportunity', calls for better auditing and monitoring of how dementia funding is spent.

Tax rules slow down non-dom arrivals in UK- Financial Times 14/03/10

“Tax changes aimed at raising millions in extra revenue from non-domiciled residents have slowed the number of wealthy business people moving to the country and contributed to a small number leaving it, according to the first in-depth study into Britain’s population of the international super-rich. Treasury data obtained under Freedom of Information rules combined with a survey of 25 leading wealth advisers in London indicate that restrictions brought in by the Finance Act 2008 are leading to about 25 per cent fewer “non-doms” applying to move to Britain.”

Patients Association releases research on out of hours care- The Patients Association 13/03/10

“The Patients Association has released information obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests and analysis of the unweighted results of the National GP Patient Survey quarters 1 and 2 2009/10 of over a million patients which highlighted wide variations in spending and reveals a league table of poor patient satisfaction with out of hours care. FOI results from 90 Trusts reveal that the average spend per head of the registered patient population was £9.00 but there was significant variation with the lowest spending less than £1.50 and the highest over £20.00.”

Underground row changes tack- The Independent 11/03/10

“The row over funding for the London Tube upgrade switched to a new, but equally incendiary tack yesterday after the independent Arbiter settled the value of the next slug of work at £4.46bn and immediately faced a threat of a legal challenge from Transport for London (TfL)...The two sides have already been at each other's throats for months over costs, culminating in a furore over the Victoria line upgrade. It took a Tube Lines' Freedom of Information request to prove that the £2.3m/km cost put up by LU to inform Mr Bolt's [the arbiter's] decision on a fair price for Tube Lines was far short of the £4.25m/km reality. Mr Bolt was convinced and his upward revision of the allowance for Tube Lines (from £2.5m to £2.7m) formed part of the increase in yesterday's determination.”

Carer respite funding 'spent elsewhere' say charities- BBC 08/03/10

“Millions of pounds intended to fund respite breaks for voluntary carers in England has been spent on other areas of the NHS, according to two charities. The government announced in 2008 that it was doubling money set aside to allow long-term carers some time off - £50m this year and £100m next year. The Crossroads Care and Princess Royal Trust for Carers say only 23% of this year's cash is being spent on carers. NHS Trust representatives say money was moved to best meet local needs. The two charities say the problem is that the money was never ring-fenced by the government and simply added to existing health budgets. Some trusts have no idea how much money they received towards respite breaks, the charities claim.(…) The charities based their analysis on responses to Freedom of Information requests from 100 primary care trusts.”

Lord Ashcroft's secret tax deal saved him millions- The Times 02/03/10

“Lord Ashcroft, the Tory deputy chairman and its most high-profile donor, struck a private deal ten years ago to save himself tax on his overseas income, it emerged yesterday. The billionaire peer stunned many in his party when he revealed himself as a non-dom despite repeated assurances to the contrary by senior Conservatives (…) Lord Ashcroft issued his statement after the Cabinet Office was forced under freedom of information rules to publish terms of the deal under which he assumed his seat in the Lords in October 2000 after twice having his nomination rejected. He made the “solemn and binding” undertaking to Mr Hague on March 23, 2000. The document does not refer to tax. It gives his “unequivocal assurance” to take up permanent UK residence within the year.”

Regional

Queen rock star condemns Welsh badger cull- Wales Online 23/03/10

“A badger cull in West Wales was the “very first resort” of Assembly ministers “unwilling to listen to their own advisers”, a court heard yesterday. At a legal challenge by The Badger Trust to the cull in Pembrokeshire and Ceredigion, lawyers for the trust said Assembly Government officials were involved in a “cloak and dagger” meeting with Whitehall civil servants eight days before Rural Affairs Minster Elin Jones decided to cull badgers.”

Carlisle Council to consult over plans for flats for homeless families- The Carlisle News & Star 16/03/10

“Campaigners fighting plans to build flats for homeless families off Newtown Road, Carlisle, have won a major concession from the city council. It has promised to consult nearby residents on the suitability of the proposed site, a former bowling green between Wood Street and Bright Street. There was an outcry when details of the £1.8m scheme emerged after our sister newspaper, The Cumberland News, used the Freedom of Information Act to obtain information. A petition against it quickly attracted nearly 200 signatures. The council’s executive had been expected to release the land for the development yesterday. That will now not happen, at least until after the consultation.”

Housing on Clifton and Gamston green belt is 'inevitable'- Thisisnottingham.co.uk 12/03/10

“It is "inevitable" that thousands of homes will be built on green- belt land at Clifton and Gamston, councillors have secretly been advised. The areas could help meet Government demands for 10,500 homes to be built in Rushcliffe borough, on the edge of the city, by 2026. A consultation has been launched to gather residents' views. But campaigners claim the advice to borough councillors – revealed under the Freedom of Information Act – shows there is little choice in the consultation.”

Top-secret Wirral Council letter to library inquiry chairman Sue Charteris- Wirral Globe 11/03/10

“A top-secret letter to the chairman of an inquiry into the closure of Wirral libraries - which to date has been kept from public view - has finally emerged. Wirral Council sought to keep their response to the draft report by inquiry inspector Sue Charteris under wraps. But a Freedom of Information request to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport has brought the document into the public domain. The council sparked a public outcry last year when it ruled that 11 libraries plus leisure centres, swimming pools and public halls should close. The plan was "called in" by the DCMS, which told the authority a local inquiry must be held. In the days before the inquiry's findings were revealed, the Labour and Liberal Democrat administration made the bombshell announcement that it had withdrawn the closure plan.”

Big brother council watching your bins- Woking Informer 10/03/10

“Woking Borough Council has been revealed as one of the 68 local authorities in England that has installed 'privacy-invading' microchips in its wheelie-bins. The discovery was made after campaign group Big Brother Watch sent a Freedom of Information Request to every council in the country to find out if they micro-chipped bins used for household rubbish collections. Local authorities have installed the chips to locate missing or stolen bins and return them to their owners, but the devices are also capable of weighing a bin's contents, in response to increased pressure from central government to reduce household waste and increase recycling. However campaigners have argued any monitoring is an infringement of human rights. The Big Brother Watch report states: "Placing microchips in bins capable of monitoring the content or weight of household refuse produces yet another piece of data for the state on an individual's private life that it has no right to have.”

Scotland

Ministers knew rail link could miss 2014 Games- The Herald 29/03/10

"Ministers were warned the Glasgow Airport Rail Link faced delays that could lead to it being completed only after the 2014 Commonwealth Games, despite a series of public assurances it was on track. Documents released to The Herald under Freedom of Information legislation have revealed that contingency plans factoring in delays due to difficulties in relocating facilities within the airport campus were drawn up by Transport Scotland five months before Garl was mothballed. The Government agency insisted yesterday it had drawn up separate plans that would have seen work completed by November 2013, and that Garl had been cancelled because of cuts imposed by Westminster, but it refused to provide details of the these plans.

Conflicting statistics in school nurses row- Caledonian Mercury 12/03/10

“The provision of school nurses in Scotland has become the focus of the latest pre-election spat between Labour and the SNP (…) Labour published new figures yesterday which, it claimed, showed that the SNP administration had not only failed to live up to the school nurses pledge but that it would take 27 years to fulfil the commitment at the current rate. Jackie Baillie, Labour’s health spokeswoman, argued this just was the latest in a line of broken promises, referring to the Scottish Government’s failure to stick to its promises to provide children with two hours of PE and five days of outdoor education too (…) Labour obtained the figures under the Freedom of Information Act. According to these figures, the number of school nurses in Scotland has gone up from 308 to 330 since 2007. Labour insisted this increase fell short of the “doubling” which the SNP claimed it would achieve in office.”

Scotland Office probed over charity advertising- civilsociety.co.uk 9/3/10

“A Freedom of Information request has been lodged with the Scotland Office to find out what action is being taken against charities that claim on TV ads to be UK-wide but do not actually operate in Scotland. Mr Alastair McLean – who bears no relation to the Fundraising Standards Board chief executive of the same name – lodged the question a week ago after becoming annoyed at seeing a number of charities promote themselves on Scottish TV when they did not deliver services north of the border.”

International

EU drafts warn of biofuels' link to hunger- Reuters 5/3/10

“The European Union's promotion of plant-based biofuels will raise EU farm incomes and agricultural commodity prices, but could create food shortages for the world's poorest consumers, draft EU reports show. The EU has a legal target to get a tenth of its road transport fuels from renewable sources such as biofuels by 2020. For EU farmers hit by falling incomes, Europe's 5 billion euros-per-year ($6.84 billion) biofuels market is coveted as a source of new revenues. Impact studies drafted for EU policymakers -- included in 116 documents released to Reuters under freedom of information laws -- predict that current biofuel policies will boost EU farm incomes by 3.5 percent in 2020.”