Freedom of Information: an important victory against Downing Street

The tide is finally turning in favour of the public's right to know what happens in No 10. Three years ago someone (a journalist? politician? Tesco?) requested the minutes of a 1999 meeting between Tony Blair and representatives of Walmart, the US supermarket giant that later bought Asda. Victory came this week, after the aggressive and dogged intervention of the Information Commissioner, Richard Thomas. Beneath the dry legalese of the commissioner's ruling is an astonishing story of Downing Street's obfuscation and obstruction: releasing a "misleading" summary of the minutes to fob off the requester, spurious arguments to prevent disclosure and numerous promises on timing that were broken. Downing Street said it was a "social visit" where "no concrete business was discussed" and the notes suggest that these statements were deeply misleading.

Disappointingly, the notes themselves are not particularly interesting to those outside the industry (minutes of Downing Street meetings are selective at best, where they exist at all) but a vital set of precedents have been set by the ruling, meaning that the Freedom of Information Act is becoming more powerful by the month. Here is why:

1. Downing Street tried to claim that the meeting, where Bob Martin of Walmart discussed Walmart's approach, amounted to "formulation of policy" and was therefore exempt. The Commissioner rejected this argument, frequently used by government to block releases, and in doing so significantly narrowed the ability of officials to hide behind this excuse.

2. No 10 also said that publication of the minutes would prejudice "free and frank advice" to ministers (another old favourite used to block disclosure) but the Commissioner retorted: "There is no evidence that the meeting involved anything other than the exchange of views."

3. The names of all the civil servant / special adviser participants of the meeting (Jonathan Powell and Geoffrey Norris, Blair and Brown's business guru) are included. While acknowledging that the names of more junior personnel may still be withheld, the commissioner argued "those named in this case were relatively senior officials, and could therefore expect to have their role in decision-making put under public scrutiny, the Commissioner does not consider that their names should be redacted when the information is disclosed."

So if your FOI request was rejected on any of these grounds, it might be worth asking again....

Comments

[RW]

So what's this victory? Is it a secret?

[martin brighton]

With reference to the recent announcement that Downing Street has been asked to release 1999 documents about Walmart that were requested three years ago:
As for the Freedom of Information Act, please note that, in effect, all that the ICO has said is to repeat the law.
As for his 'action', he has effectively colluded with the government in stalling the release of the information ( which has yet to be released, as Downing Street has yet to comply with the directive ) until such time as the information becomes no more than a historical curiosity. What the ICO should have done, from the first moment he was informed, was to order the immediate release of the documents, followed by court action to force compliance with the law.
He did not do so - he is as bent as his puppet-master.
Please note also that this is another case of nulabor bringing in laws to the statute books, only for the nulabor elite to ignore them at whim, as they consider themselves above the law.
A truly honest, open, transparent and accountable government would have made the documents available in 1999, and willingly provided them upon request three years ago.
- but this government is not honest, it is institutionally corrupt.

[Chuck Unsworth]

Let's not be too silly. This is but a minor loss in a major campaign, a mere skirmish. This Goverment has no intention of allowing such a trifling inconvenience to interfere with its great war to supress information.