| FREEDOM OF INFORMATION — Public authority — Information supplied under statutory procedure — Statute forbidding disclosure for other purposes of information given in confidence — Whether information exempt from disclosure pursuant to freedom of information request — Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986, s 24(1)Freedom of Information Act 2000, s 44(1)
Secretary of State for the Home Department v British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection and another; [2008] WLR (D) 129
QBD: Eady J: 25 April 2008
Where a public official reasonably believed that information had been given under a statutory procedure in circumstances which gave rise at that time to a reasonable expectation of privacy, and the statute prohibited disclosure for purposes other than those to which the Act related, that information was exempt from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
Eady J so held when allowing an appeal by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, against a decision of the Information Tribunal on 30 January 2008 to allow an appeal by the first respondent, the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, against a decision made by the second respondent, the Information Commissioner, on 12 June 2007 that the Secretary of State had fully complied with a request made by the first respondent for certain information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
EADY J said that the first respondent had made a request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 seeking detailed information under five headings in relation to nine licences which had been granted by the Secretary of State under the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 for the breeding and supply of animals for use in scientific procedures. The request had been met in part, but statutory exemptions had been relied upon in respect of information withheld. By s 44(1)(a) of the 2000 Act information was exempt from disclosure if its disclosure was prohibited by or under any enactment. The issue related to s 24(1) of the 1986 Act by which a person was guilty of an offence if otherwise than for the purposes of discharging his functions he disclosed information which he had obtained in the exercise of those functions and which he knew or had reasonable grounds for believing to have been given in confidence. The tribunal had held that, for information to have been “given in confidence”, it had to be demonstrated that there would be an actionable breach of confidence if it were revealed in response to a request under the 2000 Act. The tribunal had, however, misunderstood the law of confidence. For information to be given in confidence, it was not necessary that the information must have had the quality of confidence about it: protection arose where it was clear to those concerned that the circumstances in which the information was imparted gave rise to a reasonable expectation of privacy. The tribunal had also wrongly imported a notion of public interest into s 24(1). In relation to “given in confidence” in s 24(1) the only question was whether the relevant official reasonably believed that it had been given in confidence, in the proper sense of that term, at the time it was given.
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