Political blog, July 13: A low key cabinet and KCC cries Freedom (of Information)
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I attended this morning's cabinet meeting
(July 13) at County Hall and it was a pretty low key affair
although one or two interesting lines did emerge which I'll be
blogging on when we publish the stories. One thing that did strike
me was that absence at the meeting of any representatives from the
rather diminished number of opposition councillors.
Obviously, they are not on the cabinet but in the past, both
Labour and Liberal Democrats would turn up - usually, I suspect, as
a way of reminding the cabinet that someone was keeping an eye on
what they were up to (other than the press).
Today, the public seats were empty. Perhaps opposition members
were keeping an eye on things via the webcast of the meeting.
Either way, it struck me as rather odd.
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County council
leader Paul Carter has taken us to task over our
coverage over the controversial increase in allowances members
voted to accept recently. He's written a piece for the
Kent
Messenger (July 10) saying the coverage of the story
was sensationalist and in his view "downright wrong". The
article is on page 52 of this week's paper. We'd like to know what
you think.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
How open and transparent is
Kent County Council? That rather depends on how
you read or interpret figures.
According to a response to a recent Freedom of
Information request on this question, KCC has - since the
Act came into force - dealt with 3,427 requests falling under its
scope. Of these, 65 per cent were fully answered or complied with.
Of the 35 per cent that were not, nearly half were rejected because
KCC did not hold the information sought.
So, KCC has answered roughly two thirds of all requests it has
received, which to be fair isn't that bad.
But my own view is that the number of requests any public
authority deals with under FOI is not always a reliable indicator
of how open and transparent they are.
Receiving and dealing with large numbers of requests is
not, of itself, a positive indicator for the simple reason that
under the Act, where authorities already publish information
sought, they do not have to deal with requests. Now, it's true that
a lot of requests made are by individuals asking for information
that might not have a wider interest.
Nevertheless, there is a strong argument that the
fewer requests an authority receive is a better measure of
their approach to openness. If they are dealing with less requests,
it follows that they must automatically be publishing information
as a matter of course.
Monday, July 13 2009
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