Meeting the meta-request
Is it vexatious to follow up a freedom of information request by later asking the public authority for all their internal correspondence on the handling of your initial request?
This is what is called a 'meta-request' in the trade. Some FOI officers would certainly find it vexing - but that doesn't necessarily give them the right to consider the request 'vexatious' and thus legally reject it.
Earlier this month the Scottish Information Commissioner Kevin Dunion that the Scottish Government has to give the journalist Rob Edwards various documents relating to how they handled a previous request of his. Dunion dismissed the argument about vexation, along with most of the case put forwards by Scottish ministers.
Dunion has been considering this complaint for sixteen months. But it seems that such long delays in Scotland are being eliminated. Dunion says that he expects he will soon finish dealing with all complaints made to him before the start of the year (apart from some delayed by legal actions).
This will be a stark contrast with the backlog of cases at the office of the UK Information Commissioner, Richard Thomas, who covers FOI in England, Wales and Northern Ireland and is still dealing with appeals submitted over three years ago (including one of mine).
Another difference is that while Thomas's caseload is stable, the number of complaints to the Scottish Commissioner is dropping, as Dunion discussed in a he gave yesterday to a seminar at the Constitution Unit at University College, London. The reasons for this are unclear. Is it a good sign that requesters are getting the material they want, or a bad sign that they are no longer bothering?
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