Freedom of Information Act
Introduction – Your right to know
Nottinghamshire County Council is committed to Freedom of Information, for further details about the legislation visit www.legislation.hmso.gov.uk. After 1 January 2005 you will have an unprecedented right of access to Council and other public information. This new law applies to 100,000 public bodies including the government, police, fire authorities and councils. Have a look at our FOI Policy to see how we intend to approach FOI, for more details why not have a look at:
Information Bank
You will find a lot of information about what we do and the services we offer on our website. We have also put together other information we think you might want easy access to in our “Information Bank”, this means you can find the information you need when you need it. If you cannot find the information you need you could try:
- our Ask A Question facility
or
- make an FOI request in writing to us.
I need help to make an FOI request
We are keen to help you exercise your legal rights so you can get the information you want, this will also help us to understand what is important to you. In the first instance please speak to our County Contact Advisors on tel: 01777 713800 or 01623 476800 or e-mail: enquiries@nottscc.gov.uk, please note that they may refer you to someone else in the Council to give you advice.
FOI Requests
We must normally deal with all written requests for information within 20 working days. We will track and monitor the kinds of requests we are getting and decide whether to add information that may be interest to other people to our Information Bank.
Cost
We will calculate how long it will take us to find the information you have asked for and how much it will cost us. If the cost to us is £450 which is the same as two and a half days searching and collating the information, the law says we can refuse to provide the information. Rather than flatly refuse however, we will ask you to clarify your request so that we can find and provide the information more easily. We will ask you to pay postage and any copying charges before we send the information out to you.
Exemptions
We may not be able to give you all or any of the information you request. This is because there are some exemptions to your right to know. For example data protection rules will still prevent you seeing someone else’s personal information. Information which is due to be published at a later date will normally not be available to you before that date. If we apply an exemption we will tell you and give you the reason. Some exemptions come in two parts and may mean that we release information even though we could withhold it where it is in the public interest.
Appeals or complaints
If we refuse all or some of your request you have the right to ask us to review our decision. If you are dissatisfied with our response you can also ask for a review. You can do this by writing to the Chief Executive, who will not have had prior dealings with your request:
Chief Executive
Nottinghamshire County Council
County Hall
West Bridgford
Nottingham
NG2 7QP
If you are still dissatisfied you can appeal to the Information Commissioner: www.informationcommissioner.gov.uk and ultimately to the Information Tribunal: www.foi.gov.uk
Access to information
| 
