Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, whether the Local Authority Discretionary Grants Fund is (a) subject to Freedom of Information requests or (b) protected under the GDPR.

All recorded information held by MHCLG as a public authority is eligible for disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. In some instances a FOI request may be refused if the information requested falls under one of Act’s exemptions, including that for personal data

Local authorities are responsible for the delivery of grants to businesses, and therefore details of individual grant awards would need to be directed to local authorities. Under guidance for the Local Authority Discretionary Grants Fund, local authorities are required to set out the scope of their discretionary grant scheme on their website, providing clear guidance on which types of business are being prioritised.