Gloucestershire trust breaches FOIA – ICO

On 29 November we published Gloucestershire Hospital NHS Foundation Trust’s response to our Freedom of Information (FOI) request. They avoided the question, so we referred them to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). This is the ICO’s resulting decision.

Decision (including any steps ordered).

1. The complainant has requested from Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (the Trust) information about referrals to the Nursing and Midwifery Council (the NMC). The Trust denied holding any information in response to the request.

2. The Commissioner’s decision is that Trust breached section 16 of FOIA because it failed to obtain the correct objective reading of the request.

3. The Commissioner requires the Trust to take the following steps to ensure compliance with the legislation. • Issue a fresh response to the request based on the interpretation set out in paragraph 16 of this notice.

4. The public authority must take these steps within 30 calendar days of the date of this decision notice. Failure to comply may result in the Commissioner making written certification of this fact to the High Court pursuant to section 54 of the Act and may be dealt with as a contempt of court.

    Let’s see if the trust sends us an early Xmas pressie! We’ll keep watching them.

    This is the full decision letter from the ICO.

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