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Sunday 21 December 2014

Knowle relocation project: FOI request goes to tribunal: further information

There has not been much news for some weeks about the District Council's appeal against the Information Commissioner's Office request that it publish reports on its relocation project:
Futures Forum: Knowle relocation project: latest news on ...... FOI request goes to tribunal ... and ... Knowle on the market

Other than:
> the District Council has submitted further evidence and the parties have been given further time to respond to this; and 
> the Tribunal panel will be meeting and will publish its decision in the New Year.

At last week's District Council meeting
Futures Forum: Knowle relocation project: 'The EDDC Conservative group should have made the need to protect East Devon countryside and the need to deliver an adopted Local Plan its top priority. Instead it has put all its energy and a huge amount of financial resource into building itself new offices'

... questions were asked about the relocation project, including the case before the Tribunal:


IS THE LEADER LISTENING? MORE QUESTIONS PUT TO HIM AT FULL COUNCIL

December 18th, 2014

Question 6 1-5: Procedure Rule 9.2 to the Leader of the Council from Councillor Claire Wright

Question 1: Please detail the total costs incurred so far by EDDC as a result of resisting the Information Commissioner`s ruling that EDDC should release information relating to the office relocation project.

Answer: It was not this Council’s desire to see this matter go to a tribunal and EDDC offered to resolve the matter by correspondence but the Information Commissioner decided otherwise resulting in time and expense. The legal expertise required by the Council has cost £7600 to date.

Q2 Please state the estimated figure before commencing the court action. Please state the expected final total of the cost to EDDC.

Answer: As has been previously said, this kind of tribunal is a new process. It is not EDDC that ‘commenced’ this action. The Council had sought to resolve the matter by correspondence rather than the more expensive and time consuming process of a hearing. As such we did not have a budget estimate for the activity.


Is the Leader listening? More questions put to him at Full Council | East Devon Alliance

Cllr Wright has just written a piece on her blog: further comments follow:


EDDC leader blames Information Commissioner for secret paperwork legal battle costs

Saturday, 20 December 2014 3 Comments by Claire

One of the more surprising answers I received to my questions at Wednesday evening’s full council meeting related to how much the legal costs were amassing, fighting the Information Commissioner’s ruling that key reports on the state of the Knowle must be made public.

Many of you will remember that EDDC has been fighting the Information Commissioner’s ruling for months, and it is STILL continuing - even after a tribunal at Exeter Magistrates Court in August, based on a flimsy technicality that the consultant from David Langdon is equivalent to an employee of the council.

I am also very surprised that the legal fees aren’t very much higher, given that a barrister represented the council for a whole day at the courts in August - and EDDC’s battle with the Information Commissioner has been rumbling on for ages.

My first question was: “Please detail the total costs incurred so far by EDDC as a result of resisting the Information Commissioner`s ruling that EDDC should release information relating to the office relocation project.”

EDDC Conservative leader, Paul Diviani’s answer was: “It was not this Council’s desire to see this matter go to a tribunal and EDDC offered to resolve the matter by correspondence but the Information Commissioner decided otherwise resulting in time and expense.

“The legal expertise required by the Council has cost £7600 to date.”

My second question was: “Please state the estimated figure before commencing the court action. Please state the expected final total of the cost to EDDC.”

The response was: “As has been previously said, this kind of tribunal is a new process. It is not EDDC that ‘commenced’ this action. The Council had sought to resolve the matter by correspondence rather than the more expensive and time consuming process of a hearing. As such we did not have a budget estimate for the activity.”

Comments


1. At 05:52 pm on 20th Dec Tim wrote:

Well, as the late departed Mandy Rice Davis would say, “well he would wouldn’t he”. This man has lost all credibility.


2. At 06:39 pm on 20th Dec Conrad Black wrote:

Our congratulations to Councillor Diviani for demonstrating so clearly a lack of grasp of the situation. Some governing part of EDDC has decided that it wishes to keep material financial expenditure secret from the electorate it is duty bound to serve. The Information Commissioner has told them they have a duty to disclose. But they are incapable of accepting the ruling of the Information Commissioner and would rather spend more than £10,000 of our money, including officer time (enough to refurbish a play area or two?) to keep information that should clearly be in the public domain secret.

There are significant cutbacks in funding to cope with, but this leader has seen fit to waste money on an unnecessary irrelevance rather than use that money to shore up essential public services, and to continue to do that. That is the true measure of the moral bankruptcy of this administration.


3. At 09:56 am on 21th Dec Sandra Semple wrote:

I was at the First Tier Tribunal at Exeter Magistrates Court in August when the Information Commissioner’s team took on East Devon District Council. I can TOTALLY understand why it was done in person and in public and not on paper.

Mr Cohen and Mr Pratten required constant questioning of them to elicit their answers which were still evasive!

Had the process been done on paper - it would have taken YEARS and YEARS as EDDC would have dragged their heels to ensure the information stayed secret, only dripping out as little information as possible.

I am sure the Commissioner agrees to paper examination only when she trusts the opposite side to play fair.

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