2.1 The Local Government Act 1974 (“LGA”)

The LGA says information obtained in the course of an investigation must not be disclosed. However, there are exceptions to this general rule, for example, where the disclosure is for the purposes of an investigation, report or statement.

2.2 The UK General Data Protection Regulation (“UK GDPR”)

It lays down rules about protecting the personal data of natural persons and rules about the free movement of personal data. It protects fundamental rights and freedoms of natural persons and in particular, their right to the protection of personal data.

It gives living individuals rights over, and access to, personal data recorded about them in an organisation’s files. A request from an individual for personal data is known as a ‘subject access’ request. Such requests can only be from or with the consent of the data subject, that is, the person the requested information is about. Most requests for casework information will need to be considered as subject access requests. Where relevant, this overrides the LGA restriction.

There are other rights of data subjects, which are detailed later in this document.

2.3 The Data Protection Act 2018 (“DPA18”)

The DPA18 covers the ‘derogations’ allowed in the UK GDPR, e.g. specific exemptions from disclosing data to data subjects in response to a subject access request.

2.4 The Freedom of Information Act 2000 (“FOIA”)

This is the widest regime as it provides a right of access to any information held by a public authority, other than personal or environmental information, subject to any exemptions that may apply. These include an exemption from the general right of access where information is confidential under other legislation.

The FOIA is designed to open up information to the public and therefore any information provided under FOIA is a release to the world at large. Most general requests for information will need to be considered under the FOIA.

2.5 The Environmental Information Regulations 2004 (“EIRs”)

These regulations provide public access rights to environmental information. The definition is broad and covers such things as health and safety, waste, emissions, noise, land, planning and historic sites.

2.6 The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 (“POFA”)

This amends the FOIA by giving a right of access to information in “datasets” (collections of raw factual information held electronically, all or most of which has been obtained or recorded to provide us with information about our services). As far as reasonably practicable, we must provide the information in a reusable electronic form if this is requested. We must also publish and update any dataset which has been requested, if it is reasonably practicable to do so.