[Scottish] Freedom of Information

[Keith Stenson]

> On Friday 12 Nov 2004 19:23, Colin Speirs wrote:
> > hi
> >
> > Can anyone help me here
> >
> > Come Jan 1st 2005 public bodies in Scotland are covered by Freedom 
> > of Information. One of the strictures is to provide the info in the 
> > requested format.
> >
> > Could that include specifying a word processor file format? Like 
> > Open Office or KWord?
> 
> I would doubt it, I presume they are talking about fax, email, letter 
> etc etc, Or else people would be requesting info on vampires in blood 
> on human skin parchment, and all sorts of spooky stuff.
> 
> PDF, RTF are portable formats, so I would imgaine that will be their 
> choice.
> --

The FOI act included all information, electronic and paper based. You also
have to provide the information in a manner that is easily accessible to the
person requesting the information i.e. if a person wants to see all
communication between two parties about some sort of decision that has been
made and they don't have a computer, you have to provide emails and word
documents in paper format. If they want, they could however ask for this
info to be provided in it original file formats.

There is a guideline that an org. can refuse a request if it is seen to be
frivolous or would incur extreme costs for an org to process. 

You also have 21 days to provide any requested information or if you do not
hold the information you must help them to find the right org. that would
have the requested information. However the 21 day clock is ticking as soon
as they contact you.

Keith.