[open-government] Fwd: [ORG-law] UK foia reach on private government subcontractors

Wed Nov 17 07:44:26 UTC 2010

The UK government opened consultation a year or so ago, declaring it is
considering extension of the law to private bodies. But the outcome was very
poor, it was extended only to four organizations, of clear public nature.

To those realy interested, I am attaching a legal article I wrote on the
whole issue of FOIAs coverages of private entitites. It includes a short
review of the UK.

Roy

On Tue, Nov 16, 2010 at 5:18 PM, <toby at law-democracy.org> wrote:

>
> I believe there were reforms on the way (probably by way of regulation but
> perhaps by amendments to the legislation) to substantially extend the
> reach of the law to private bodies undertaking public functions, but I am
> not sure exactly where they are. Ditto for Scotland.
>
> Toby
>
> > -Response form our legal working group about UK:
> >
> > The FOI doesn't have a functional definition of a public authority.
> > Public authorities are those defined as such in the act or subordinate
> > legislation. There are many anomalies - for example a wholly owned
> > subsidiary of a public authority is also subject to the act (by
> > section 6) but a subsidiary of more than one public authority is not
> > (so many local government consortia fall outside).
> >
> > Information held "on behalf of" a public body is also subject to the
> > act, which does extend the reach somewhat, but that phrase has caused
> > a lot of argument.
> >
> > There are some silly exceptions because of the way the act works, for
> > example the House of Commons Commission claims not to be a public
> > body:
> >
> >
> http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/crowned_portcullis_2#incoming-80758
> >
> > The House of Commons itself ceases to exist when Parliament is
> > dissolved for a general election, so this produced some peculiar (and
> > frustrating) results at the last election.
> >
> > I have certainly been pushing for changes and extensions here.
> > Something simple, such as any corporation with more public authority
> > members than not ought to be a public authority (to get in all those
> > local authority consortia etc). There are plenty more.
> >
> > The team at What Do They Know (team at whatdotheyknow.com) might be very
> > helpful if you asked them nicely about it. I suspect its something My
> > Society in general is very interested in.
> >
> > ---------------
> >
> > On 16 November 2010 11:53, Javier Ruiz <javier at openrightsgroup.org>
> wrote:
> >> Dear friends
> >> is there anything like this in UK FOIA ?
> >> The government has announced plans to amend FOIA towards "right to
> >> data",
> > it
> >> may be an opportunity to put forward other amendments to extend who is
> >> covered by it.
> >> best, Javier
> >>
> >> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> >> From: Katleen Janssen <Katleen.Janssen at law.kuleuven.be>
> >> Date: 2010/11/15
> >> Subject: Re: [open-government] Defining Open Government Data?
> >> To: Tony Kennick <tony at technophobia.com>,
> >> "open-government at lists.okfn.org"
> >> <open-government at lists.okfn.org>
> >>
> >>
> >> The ‘privatization of data’ through outsourcing can be a concern, but
> > there
> >> are some examples where the definition of ‘public authority’ subject to
> > the
> >> FOI legislation should be broad enough to cover these types of
> >> outsourcing
> >> deals.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> For instance, the Belgian legislation includes bodies that have been
> >> entrusted by a ‘real’ public body with a service performed in the public
> >> interest. The European directive on environmental information should
> >> probably also be broad enough to cover these situations.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Is the UK definition not broad enough to cover this?
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Best regards,
> >>
> >> katleen
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> From: open-government-bounces at lists.okfn.org
> >> [mailto:open-government-bounces at lists.okfn.org] On Behalf Of Tony
> >> Kennick
> >> Sent: maandag 15 november 2010 13:01
> >> To: open-government at lists.okfn.org
> >>
> >> Subject: Re: [open-government] Defining Open Government Data?
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> 2010/11/15 Javier Ruiz <javier at openrightsgroup.org>
> >>
> >> One of the key improvements to this area would be to extend the FoI
> >> obligations to private companies doing public works.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Any such extension would need careful drafting so it couldn't be used by
> >> competitors to dig out data from parts of any such company.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>  The amount of "public data" could almost disappear in cases such as
> > Suffolk
> >> council in UK, which plan to outsource every single
> >> service http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11398678. Even the remaining info
> >> on
> >> contracting would likely be denied on commercial confidentiality
> >> grounds.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> The governments plans for data to be opened up so the public can
> >> directly
> >> assess the performance of local authorities only makes sense if it
> >> doesn't
> >> matter whether the council provides services directly or by contracting
> >> out. Whole swathes of data publishing will need to be set out in
> >> contracts
> >> as a required as part of the service delivery.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >>
> >> Tony Kennick
> >>
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> > --
> > Francis Davey
> >
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> ___________________________________
> Toby Mendel
>
> Centre for Law and Democracy
> toby at law-democracy.org
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