Freedom of Information
The Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA)
came into full force on 1 January 2005. This Act gives
everyone the right to see recorded information held by the
Council.
The aim of the FOIA is to promote a culture of
openness and accountability amongst public sector bodies thereby
improving public understanding of the workings of the Council, why
we make the decisions we do, and how public money is spent.
Although FOIA presumes openness it recognises
the need to protect sensitive information in certain circumstances
and provides for exemptions.
The FOIA is overseen by the Information
Commissioner who also has responsibility for:-
- The Data Protection Act 1998
enabling individuals to access information about themselves,
and
- The Environmental Information Regulations 2004 enabling people
to access environmental information.
The FOIA enables people to access all other
information and the reasoning behind decisions and policies, which
do not fall under DPA or EIR.
Application Form to Request Access to Information
Publication Scheme
Under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 Dover District Council
is required to prepare a Publication
Scheme.
This scheme sets out what information the Council routinely
makes available to the public. It will be useful to members of the
public who want to find out more information about the Council and
aims to make our published documents as widely available as
possible. Please look at our publication
scheme page for further details.
How Are We Doing?
Over the last three years, of all the Freedom of Information
requests received by DDC 98% were answered within the statutory 20
days.
The remaining 2% were refused on the
grounds that they were either:
- Personal data (names and addresses of
tenants etc)
- Subject of an on-going
investigation
- Would take longer to 18 hours to
collate. In these cases applicants were invited into the offices to
view the data themselves if they wished
For further information
E-mail: freedomofinformation@dover.gov.uk
Information Commissioner's Office: www.ico.gov.uk
