Freedom of Information

Debate between Elfyn Llwyd and Philip Hollobone

Thursday 24th January 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

Thank you, Sir Alan, for that point of order. The Clerk made us aware of the Division, but I will ensure that your comments are relayed to the appropriate authorities.

[Mr Llwyd]

As I mentioned, the Freedom of Information Act has developed—some might say radically—the extent to which the public are able to engage with the decisions made by public bodies. First, however, they must choose to engage.

Perhaps inevitably, the tendency of the media is to focus on the negative stories coming out of FOI requests; some say, which I believe could be true, that this may have led to a perverse incentive to hide information. The former Cabinet Secretary, Lord Gus O’Donnell, said in his evidence that he had experienced that at first hand:

“I decided to release, since I am not paid by anybody at the minute but I am a Member of the Lords, some hospitality information. I do not think anybody else does that. Surprise, surprise, you get a snidey press story in Private Eye as a result of this.”

The Select Committee, however, was very much of the opinion that the increased and, yes, sometimes unfair criticism of those in public life was a price well worth paying for greater openness.

To what extent has the Act facilitated decision making by public authorities and central Government? Regrettably, many witnesses thought that in trying to avoid the possible embarrassment of disclosure, fewer bodies were inclined to keep detailed records of meetings or to keep a log of policy information. Martin Rosenbaum, representing BBC News, argued that any change in culture brought about by the Freedom of Information Act had been inconsistent, and that the Act has done relatively little to advance transparency on account of the cumbersome nature of the FOI process. He said that

“the Act now enables us to obtain on a very crude level…facts and figures—how much was spent on this, statistics about the performance of public services and so on. The sorts of things that were harder to get previously now tend to be very easy to get, but what it has not produced, and the civil service is certainly very resistant to this, is internal discussion documents, policy discussion, minutes of meetings and so on.”

Witnesses spoke about the “chilling effect”, to which the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed referred, that has led to civil servants being less candid in their advice to Ministers, fewer external organisations being willing to submit information to the Government and fewer meetings being held with formal minutes taken—greatly damaging the official record. As Lord O’Donnell pointed out, that “chilling effect” not only impacts on the engagement of our own generation with decision making, but will make it increasingly difficult for future historians, too, to get an accurate picture of how decisions were made, as so little evidence will remain.

Other witnesses pointed out that that unintended consequence of the Act has the potential to weaken Cabinet collective responsibility, since many key decisions will not be made in Cabinet, where formal minutes are taken, but in safe places, be it on mobile phones or behind closed doors. On the other hand, it is imperative to draw attention to the fact that the Act contains safeguards against that problem—namely, exemptions to the right of access to information in exceptional circumstances, as well as other ministerial vetoes for when information is deemed too sensitive to release.