Whistleblowers have raised concerns about electricity grid security…and Freedom of Information obligations being avoided.
Jump to this week’s FOI stories…
Multiple people have approached the shadow energy secretary, Claire Coutinho, warning it’s getting tougher to keep Britain’s electricity supply in line with demand.
They also say engineers were instructed to use “live”, or to draft documents that weren’t disclosable under Freedom of Information rules.
The National Energy System Operator (Neso) has announced the appointment of an external law firm to conduct an investigation into the allegation.
‘Can we just not answer?’
Attempts to avoid scrutiny via FOI have been going on since the Act came into force.
Broadly, you can’t “draft documents” that wouldn’t be within scope for disclosure. If it’s written down and it relates to the public authority’s official business, it may be subject to FOI.
(Starting my job in the public sector and someone told me Teams messages weren’t covered by FOI…yeah, hate to break it to you…).
But if information doesn’t become part of the organisation’s records, it can be hard to access.
This can include information in private messaging channels that doesn’t get flagged and archived. Or things that are ephemeral – auto-deleting WhatsApp messages, real-times systems with no recording process, verbal conversations.
Some degree of unrecorded decision-making is normal – people making a quick plan in a conversation with colleagues. (Although, a fascinating development is going to be the information held from recorded and AI-transcribed meetings, rather than just minutes).
But regularly missing information on decisions should ring alarm bells.
Why was there no log update or handover for what went on with the live system in the previous shift? Why no meeting minutes? Why are we now spending this money with no paper trail?
Never mind FOI, public sector audit bodies don’t love this either.
Which means dealing with this kind of behaviour is both the responsibility of the Information Commissioner’s Office – in ensuring public bodies take FOI seriously and have good records management policies – and more widely those with powers to scrutinise the public sector, auditors, regulators, parliament, by ensuring they have information to work with.
Freedom of Information fit for a King
Green MP Siân Berry has presented her Bill to extend the FOI Act to the Royals to parliament.
If it becomes law, the Ten-Minute Rule Bill would remove the Section 37 exemption relating to communications involving the King, the heir to the throne, or the awarding of honours. It would also make the Sovereign, Royal Family, Royal Household, Royal Archives, and the Duchies of Cornwall and Lancaster public authorities for the purposes of the Act.
The Brighton Pavilion MP argued the Royals, as public servants, should be expected to follow the Nolan principles of public life, including: “Information should not be withheld from the public unless there are clear and lawful reasons for doing so”.
She said: “This sounds like a Bill only for republicans, but I believe that monarchists should be its most fervent supporters.
“No one has damaged the reputation of the monarchy in this country and abroad more than Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, who was able to carry on his nefarious activities in the comfort of knowing that he was protected by this shroud of secrecy.
“Yes, we found him out many years later and took away his offices, but the sunlight of Nolan is not only disinfectant in retrospect, but also preventive. If he had had to be open, would he have been as bad? We will never know.”
Ms Berry mentioned bodies that are covered by the Act when the Royals aren’t – the Advisory Board on the Registration of Homoeopathic Products, the British Wool Marketing Board, the Commissioners of Northern Lighthouses and the Government Hospitality Advisory Committee for the Purchase of Wine (start thinking of some requests you can get into these!).
The Bill wasn’t opposed at its first reading, with a second reading scheduled for November. However, it’s still unlikely to become law without Government support, and there’s been none indicated so far.
Access to information
Generally FOI requests are an indicator that people think you could be more transparent. As other public authorities and industry bodies tend not to send them, when they do, it might be an indicator of bigger problems.
The British Horseracing Authority (BHA) is unhappy about the Gambling Commission’s plans to implement affordability checks on bettors in the UK. The organisation thinks the Gambling Commission and the Government have ignored its concerns.
The BHA made an FOI request for correspondence between the Gambling Commission, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and NatCen, the research group charged with reviewing the research gathered in the affordability checks pilot.
It’s not entirely clear what’s happened here but there does seem to be a breakdown in relations between the Gambling Commission and BHA.
The report says the request was refused as “vexatious”. But that seems like an odd exemption to rely on for a single, fairly sensible seeming, request. The reply also referred to the subject being “a live matter of public interest”.
The Gambling Commission’s disclosure log is fairly up-to-date but doesn’t appear to include this request.
But there is a similar one from April. That one was refused under Section 22A – the information is part of a research programme and there are plans to publish a report on it in the future. Which makes more sense as an exemption.
So, what’s going on?
It’s not clear if an internal review was requested (the refusal is very vague on what is planned for publication and when). It’s possible a second request was made for functionally the same information (e.g. expanding it to include NatCen), which then attracted the vexatious refusal.
Section 22 and 22A refusals are an area where making the same request again may be reasonable. The timeline for publication of information may pass or circumstances change, which may change the balance of the public interest test.
For example, once the Gambling Commission has announced it’s going ahead with the affordability checks, it could be argued that the pilot scheme and its evaluation are finished and its in the public interest to release more information relating to it.
Either way, not publishing more information clearly isn’t inspiring confidence.
This week’s Freedom of Information stories…
Children in care
Children in Scotland’s care system are twice as likely to die as others, yet the majority of their deaths are still not being reviewed, The Ferret has found.
Campaigners say these revelations, revealed in a freedom of information (FoI) request, mean vital lessons that could save lives are not being learned.
Figures, provided by the Scottish Government, suggested 22 children in care – or who were under 26 and care leavers receiving after care services – died in 2025. Using figures for the deaths of all children, The Ferret has calculated that this is twice the death rate of children who have not been in the care system.
A lack of cells
Police officers are transporting suspected criminals for hours at a time due to a quarter of Scotland’s custody cells being out of action.
The number of custody cells available across the country currently stands at 826 at full capacity.
However, according to figures obtained by a Freedom of Information request, the force is currently operating with just 625 cells.
Councillor casework
Being a hardworking councillor doesn’t seem to improve your chances of re-election.
New Freedom of Information figures reveal ten Lambeth councillors handled 43% of the borough’s resident casework over the past four years.
The 24,000 cases submitted between May 2022 and May 2026 were shared unequally between councillors, however. The ten busiest councillors handled 10,351 cases between them, while the bottom ten handled only 383.
During the recent local elections on 7 May, the Green Party won 29 of the 63 council seats, putting an end to two decades of Labour control. Several of Labour’s busiest caseworkers lost their seats in the win.
Outside contractors
A total of 65 companies have been paid at least £1m by Edinburgh council in the first three months of the year, official figures reveal.
Data obtained by the Local Democracy Reporting Service through Freedom of information legislation shows that the firms took in £198.4m in total, a significant portion of the council’s more than £342.6m outside spend over the period.
Contracting outside companies for various tasks is a normal practice for local authorities across the UK. Most of the 65 firms are involved in construction, information technology, health and social care and housing.
Data breaches
Scotland’s NHS boards have recorded more than 5,000 data breaches over the last four years, The Ferret can reveal.
Incidents included staff sharing confidential patient information, a cancer patient’s medical records being wrongly accessed, and private phone numbers exposed after a cyber attack.
Freedom of information requests sent to Scotland’s 14 health boards also found that Police Scotland has been informed of data breaches six times, while at least 182 staff faced disciplinary sanctions.
Influencers
Almost £2,000 of taxpayers’ money was spent on social media influencers in Teesside, without evidence that the expense delivered any return.
A recent freedom of information request revealed that Stockton Council used the money to appoint influencers based outside of the region to promote local events and exhibitions.
However, it has not been able to provide any information to suggest whether its campaigns were a success for taxpayers.
Flag removals
Council’s are not having fun removing flags that people keep putting up.
A recent Freedom of Information request found that Sutton Council spent £27,081 removing flags from council assets between 1 May 2025 and 1 May 2026. Last month, the Sutton Guardian reported how Sutton Council had removed 430 flags across the borough during that same period.
At Monday night’s full council meeting (July 13), council leader Barry Lewis reaffirmed the council’s stance against unauthorised flag raising, stating: “What we don’t want are cheap flags inappropriately tied to lampposts.”
Approximately 2,300 England and Union Jack flags have been removed in Derby in less than a year – and £2,600 has been spent on security to protect council staff from abuse.
Flags taken down are kept in storage and are not being returned to owners.
The new figures come from a Freedom of Information (FOI) request submitted by the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS).
Not so free parking
Certain car parks in Lyme Regis, Dorset, including one owned by Lyme Regis Town Council, are free to use on selected days a year, such as the Christmas lights switch-on and Remembrance Sunday.
After receiving complaints from customers, traders discovered the offer had not been implemented at the town council’s Woodmead car park. As a result, members of Cobb Traders business group, who promoted the offer to their customers, submitted a Freedom of Information request.
Data from the town council showed it collected parking fees on all 12 of its free parking days between October 2024 and May 2026, totalling more than £10,000. The data did not include any payment machine takings for five of the 12 free days because the machines had since been replaced.
Non-recyclable
Data from the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) has found that 89% of the UK’s packaging producers still supply non-recyclable, hard-to-recycle or mixed-rating packaging.
The data, obtained from a Freedom of Information request by BagKraft, detailed that 14% of the 11,701 obligated packaging producers are also supplying exclusively ‘red’-rated packaging. ‘Red’ means they are entirely reliant on ‘difficult- or problematic-to-recycle’ materials.
Big fare?
Figures released under a Freedom of Information request has shown the number of number of licensed Private Hire Vehicles and Drivers that have licenses from Wolverhampton despite having postcodes in Cardiff, Swansea and Newport.
The sharp rise in licences from City of Wolverhampton Council has led the government to propose an overhaul of the practice.
The government plans to reform taxi licensing across the country, reducing the number of bodies able to issue licences to drivers from 263 to 70 local transport authorities (LTAs), which already manage local transport planning.
Trips and slips
Falls on Middlesbrough’s pavements have resulted in a hefty bill for the local authority. Over a four year period, between 2022/23 and 2025/26, more than £860,000 was paid out in compensation for accidents on footpaths in the town, a freedom of information request has revealed.
Furniture help
End Furniture Poverty aims to address the root causes of furniture poverty – the inability to afford or access basic household necessities – and offer direct signposting to support services.
A Freedom of Information request shows that a total of 824 people applied for the scheme in Barnsley in 2025/26. Of those, 321 were successful.
A total of £346,592 was spent on the scheme.
Office refurb
More than £15,000 has been spent on decking out the new Suffolk County Council leader’s office.
Freedom of Information documents revealed senior officers discussed the requirements for the revamp for the newly elected Reform UK leader Cllr Michael Hadwen.
The works were approved on June 11 by a joint chief executive in a Microsoft Teams exchange.
Within the leader’s office, £12,816.19 will be spent on power, data, and access control works, along with a desk-side button to open the door. The overall project is estimated at £18,484.31 excluding VAT, which does not include video-conferencing equipment that was still being priced separately.
Old bangers
Data from a Freedom of Information (FOI) request from eBay found 4.4 million cars have covered 100,000 – 149,000 miles. A further 1.2 million have 150,000-199,000 on the clock, while 286,630 have covered 200,000-249,000 miles.
The FOI was submitted to the Driver & Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA). The data is based on mileage recorded at MOT tests conducted between 1st January and 31st December 2025.
The DVSA data shows 2,699 vehicles with more than 500,000 miles on the odometer.
New cameras
Wolverhampton Council has explained why cameras have appeared on a city junction that appear to be ‘pointed directly at drivers’.
A Freedom of Information request, which was submitted to the local authority by a concerned resident, questioned why low pointed cameras had been installed on Willenhall Road at the junction of Neachells Lane, Wolverhampton.
To which, the council have explained that these cameras were placed in the area temporarily to monitor journey times.
Museum charges
The Museum of Oxford began charging for entry in late January, and the impact has been revealed in new figures obtained through a Freedom of Information request.
The figures show footfall has dropped by 70-80 per cent compared to 2024-25, with income 61 per cent lower than the council’s projections, amounting to more than £53,000 less. The data covers the period from February to late May.
Campaign group Save Our Museum, which made the Freedom of Information request, said: “It’s as bad as we feared.”
Mixing up credit cards
Council officers at a West London council mistakenly used the council credit card to make personal purchases for haircuts, podcast subscriptions and greeting cards.
All councils publish larger payments either over £250 or £500 – but if you want to see what the council spends under those amounts on, you must submit a Freedom of Information request. The Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) requested all payments under £250 between April 2025 and March 2026.
The information provided returned a number of “errors” – code for council staff accidentally using council card for personal purchases. According to the council, this is often through an autofill function with the money paid back each time.
Bad smell
The Environment Agency received more than 250 odour complaints last month about a smell that has been plaguing residents in a Cumbrian town for decades.
A Freedom of Information request by campaigners showed that there were 277 regarding the so-called ‘Penrith Pong’ in June, compared to 67 in May.
Photo by Claire Abdo on Unsplash
