Why is the government bothering to set up a brand new access to information scheme, when the obvious solution is to bring housing associations under the #FOI Act?
The enforcement mechanism in the 2020 white paper looks absurd. There will be internal review by the landlord, involving up to 3 stages, followed by complaint to the Housing Ombudsman, followed by the Ombudsman referring systemic breaches to the Regulator for Social Housing.
The Housing Ombudsman will apply #FOI like exemptions, but has no experience of doing so. And unlike the @ICOnews, the Housing Ombudsman cannot enforce their decisions.
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It refers to longstanding criticisms @CampaignFOI has made of @ICOnews over the extent to which it uses its enforcement powers under #FOI and a lack of focus on its FOI work compared to data protection.
It also says "delays in our complaint handling system do understandably draw criticism from some high-profile groups, including the @CampaignFoI and @openDemocracy" and "@MySociety have suggested that the Access to Information brief should be split out of the ICO's functions".
The idea that complying with #FOI would be an obstacle to the UK becoming or remaining a ‘science superpower’ is utterly implausible. The obstacles to innovation by funding bodies have been discussed at length and do not include FOI.
All public bodies have important tasks to fulfil in the public interest & ltd resources. ARIA has no greater claim to avoid complying with #FOI than any other body. On the contrary, its budget, which outstrips that of many FOI bodies, provides compelling grounds for its inclusion
At least 750 allegations of sexual misconduct were made against serving police officers across Britain over five years, with the highest number made against @gmpolice.
It says without #FOI the extent of the company’s efforts to persuade the government to provide it with financial support, and the extraordinarily insistent lobbying by the former prime minister David Cameron may not have been uncovered, let alone documented in such detail.
It adds that the #FOI Act contains the elements of a highly effective tool to probe lobbying but it needs to be strengthened and more vigorously enforced.
Before the pandemic, @ICOnews had been moving towards issuing enforcement notices against public authorities repeatedly breaching #FOI time limits. 1/11
In November 2019 an #FOI enforcement notice was drafted against an authority in the police & justice sector which had 900 outstanding requests 3 months earlier. Because of significant improvements it was not issued. 2/11
In January 2020 @ICOnews proposed issuing an enforcement notice against the Met Police, requiring it to clear all #FOI requests over 6 months old by 31 March 2020. 3/11