Cutting waste seems to involve a lot of Freedom of Information requests (I hope FOI officers are cutting potentially wasted time answering the same thing repeatedly with some Section 21 refusals).

Reform claimed to have sent 3,000 FOI requests in order to find the ‘wasteful’ spending they planned to cut if they won control of councils.

They apparently didn’t read the FOI responses. As they then launched yet more searching for waste.

Or those responses said the same thing others on the same topic have shown…there’s just not much spending on climate change and diversity, equity and inclusion (not when you start looking at the size of the adult social care responsibilities).

Though all this will generate plenty of FOI requests on whether the whole exercise might be a waste of time.

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Cyber attacks

New data obtained via Freedom of Information Requests to the 36 Metropolitan Councils revealed an overall year on year rise in City Local Authority security breaches over the last three years. Of the 24 Met Councils that responded to the request within the deadline, there were a combined total of 12,745 data breach incidents.

Sheffield City Council reported the highest number of security incidents, totalling 1,512 in three years, followed by Manchester City Council and Wakefield Council which had 1,493 and 1,268 respectively.

Corridor care

At least two people are “expected” to be treated by medics in the corridors of the emergency department at the Royal Alexandra Hospital (RAH) every day, NHS chiefs have admitted.

But often that figure can rise to as many as six, documents have revealed. The numbers were obtained by West Scotland Labour MSP Paul O’Kane amid growing fears corridor care is being “normalised” in the Paisley hospital.

A series of heavily redacted emails – released as part of a Freedom of Information request (FOI) – reveal staff concerns over the situation and that an approach to tackle the problem was “perceived as the normalisation” of vulnerable people being treated on trollies.

Funfair injuries

“I could feel myself slip. I just woke up and I was laid on the floor on my back and I remember thinking, what am I doing here? I started panicking.” – Jade Harrison describing the moment she was thrown from a ride at Hull Fair in 2019. She suffered serious injuries, some of which she is still dealing with, six years on.

Jade is one of thousands of people who have been injured at funfairs and amusement and theme parks in England, Scotland and Wales over the last decade, a BBC Panorama investigation has found.

There were 3,188 injuries in England, Scotland and Wales between April 2014 and March 2024, including slips, trips and falls, with 350 in 2023/24, according to a Freedom of Information (FOI) request put to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE).

AI cheating

To survey the extent of academic integrity violations, The Guardian contacted 155 universities under the Freedom of Information Act requesting figures for proven cases of academic misconduct, plagiarism and AI misconduct in the last five years.

It found that as AI tools have become more sophisticated and accessible, the nature of cheating has changed, with plagiarism now in a marked decline.

The results showed that plagiarism accounted for nearly two-thirds of all academic misconduct in 2019-20. It fell from 19 per 1,000 students in 2022-23 to 15.2 in 2023-24, and is expected to fall again to about 8.5 per 1,000.

On the other hand, cheating using AI tools is on an upward trajectory. In 2023-24 there were 7,000 proven cases of AI cheating – equivalent to 5.1 for every 1,000 students. That was up from 1.6 cases per 1,000 in 2022-23.

Phone theft

With FOI sometimes the lack of an answer is the story.

Sussex Police have been branded “absurd” after admitted they have no idea how many phones are being stolen across the county – because it has stopped recording the figures.

The Argus requested phone theft figures for the past two financial years to see whether Sussex was experiencing a similar spike to other regions, and what proportion of cases were being solved.

But Sussex Police said it could not fulfil the request under the Freedom of Information Act as the data does not exist.

Close passes

Footage of dangerous overtakes on cyclists, captured by helmet and bike cameras, is being sent to police in record numbers. Data obtained by IAM RoadSmart, a road safety charity, revealed that 15,779 clips were submitted to police forces in England and Wales last year.

This is more than double the 7,249 submissions made in 2021. Many cyclists use cameras to record their journeys, with basic models available for under £50. IAM RoadSmart sent a Freedom of Information request to 43 police forces, asking for data on footage submissions showing motorists passing cyclists too closely.

‘Rowdy’ fans

Liam Gallagher has criticised a Scottish council for suggesting Oasis fans were “drunk, middle-aged and fat”. The remarks were revealed following a freedom of information request that was sent to Edinburgh council – ahead of the band’s three sold-out shows in Scotland this August.

One note warned that there would be a “substantial amount of older fans”, and that because “middle-aged men take up more room”, age and size should be considered in crowd control planning. Another note suggested “medium to high intoxication” should be expected at the concert.

An additional remark said there was some “concern about crowds of Oasis on weekends as they are already rowdy, and the tone of the band”.

Missing postboxes

A Norfolk MP has hit out at Royal Mail for failing to replace a stolen post box, branding it a serious blow to rural villagers who depend on postal services.

The theft, which took place in December 2024, is part of a wider pattern of post boxes being stolen across the county.

A Freedom of Information request to Norfolk Police revealed that more than 50 post boxes had been stolen across Norfolk between 2019 and 2024, averaging to 10 thefts per year.

Ice cream ban

WITH temperatures soaring in Herefordshire this week, many people will be after an ice cream — but many people may not know that there is actually a ban on mobile ice cream vans.

Information released by Herefordshire Council under the Freedom of Information Act reveals that the council has a ban on mobile trading in Hereford city centre, including ice cream vans.

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