Tuesday, 1 November 2016

Knowle relocation project: and clashing with the Information Commissioner over publishing key documents

The Knowle planning application is still in the pipeline - with lots of unanswered questions still:
Futures Forum: Knowle Relocation Project: How to classify the proposed development: as C3 housing or as C2 care home?




















Residents call for clarity over future Knowle use - News - Sidmouth Herald
Residents want clarification of Knowle housing designation | East Devon Watch

And now that the District Council agreed earlier today to 36 sheltered housing apartments for the elderly in Sidmouth...
DEVELOPMENT MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE - Tuesday, 1 November 2016
Futures Forum: Making millions on 'high-quality specialist retirement accommodation' in Sidmouth, rather than spending on S106 cash for affordable housing

... the question is what will happen to the 'high-quality specialist retirement accommodation' proposed for the Knowle - together with those questions over an S106 payment...

Meanwhile, there are still lots of other questions to answer around the whole relocation project:
Futures Forum: Knowle relocation project: continuing secrecy, frittering away legal fees and avoiding accountability

Including what's exactly in the contract agreed with the developer PegasusLife:
Futures Forum: Knowle relocation project: BREAKING NEWS >> >>> Information Commissioner tells East Devon District Council to publish documentation

Save Our Sidmouth covers the same story - and gives a little context:


Knowle relocation project: BREAKING NEWS >> >>> Information Commissioner tells East Devon District Council to publish documentation


October 27, 2016 by sidmouthsid Leave a comment

Details just posted on http://www.futuresforumvgs.blogspot.co.uk .

EDDC has of course already clashed with the Information Commissioner. In 2015 EDDC not only lost its Appeal to keep certain Knowle documents secret, but was severely criticised for “at times discourteous and unhelpful” conduct.

The ‘SOS Press Release on Tribunal decision’, dated 5th May 2015, puts today’s breaking news into context. Here it is: 



Knowle relocation project: BREAKING NEWS >> >>> Information Commissioner tells East Devon District Council to publish documentation | Save Our Sidmouth

Here is today's press release:

ICO tells EDDC to publish FOI documents

1 November 2016

East Devon District Council has been told it has one month to publish crucial documentation on its relocation project.

The Information Commissioner’s Office issued three separate Decision Notices on 27th October, asking it to make public “the details of the agreement it has entered into with Pegasus for the Knowle site”, as well as the Minutes of meetings and correspondence on the subject of the decision to award a contract to PegasusLife for the development of the Knowle site.

Back in 2014, EDDC had been ordered to reveal the details of documents it preferred to keep secret – but instead chose to contest the ICO’s demands.

However, it lost at a Tribunal in Exeter which told the Council to release a tranche of key documents on its relocation project. [1]

“The question now,” says Sidmouth resident and local campaigner Jeremy Woodward, who made the original Freedom of Information requests, “is whether the Council will again contest the ICO’s ruling.

“The planning application for Knowle will probably go to the Development Management Committee in December, and the Council will want to avoid any further embarrassment.”

Mr Woodward added: “This goes to the heart of how the Council operates.

“As the ICO says in its ruling, this is very much an issue of transparency”

The Information Commissioner says this case is about the Council “spending public money on its own facilities, for its own purposes.”

The Council “has argued that it needs to change offices as overall, doing so would save the public money compared to staying in its current offices.

"The public however cannot know whether this is true without further information being open for them to scrutinise.” [2]

"Finally" added Mr Woodward, "of course, is the usual complaint from EDDC that they ‘spend too much time and money’ on sorting out these FOI requests – but do they really need to spend months and hundreds of thousands on fighting openness and transparency?" [3]


Notes:

[1] Futures Forum: Knowle relocation project: FOI request goes to tribunal: detailed report of proceedings
[2] Futures Forum: Knowle relocation project: BREAKING NEWS >> >>> Information Commissioner tells East Devon District Council to publish documentation
[3] Futures Forum: Knowle relocation project: and FOI requests >>> "But these are things that people do not know: They do not know because they are not told."


END

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