FOI improvement action plan

Information on how we will improve our compliance with the FOI statutory timeframes.

Contents

How we will handle the requests received

Establish and share best practice

Action: Twice weekly meetings within the central team to discuss due cases and any escalations. Weekly reports sent to wider organisation identifying overdue cases and performance. Fortnightly clinics at Directorate Management Team (DMT) meetings.

Impact: Establish and share best practice to handle requests more efficiently.

Priority: High

Person or team responsible: Information Team Manager

Start date: 14 July 2023

End date: Ongoing

Review: As of 14/07/2023 Information Management (IM) are attending  DMTs on a monthly basis to review all overdue cases and identify colleagues to assist in closure - Resources DMT resulted in the closure of 24 cases. Exemptions and further training has been offered to all FOI contacts in the wider organisation to assist in this process. 

Current status: On-going

Increased resources

Action: A new fulltime FOI & SAR Officer and a new admin resource to be brought in for six months, until a full service and resource review is completed. Directorates have identified single point of contact within in each team of a sufficiently senior level and are identifying additional capacity to assist in the backlog closure.     

Impact: Increased resources will ensure better future resilience and help will improve compliance.

Priority: High

Person or team responsible: Data Protection Officer

Start date: 21 July 2023

End date: September 2023

Review: As of 14 July 2023 Information Management (IM) are attending  DMTs on a monthly basis to review all overdue cases and identify colleagues to assist in closure - Resources DMT resulted in the closure of 24 cases. Exemptions and further training has been offered to all FOI contacts in the wider organisation to assist in this process. 

Current status: In progress

Managing caseloads

Action: Additional sufficiently skilled admin staff being brought in to triage cases which can be closed straight away and cases which require to be escalated immediately. This will help FOI Officers and enable the focus to be on responding to requests.

Impact: Understanding the nature of your caseload allows officers to focus resources on complex cases as soon as possible. Identifying straightforward requests means a wider pool of staff can deal with those cases that are less complex.

Priority: High

Person or team responsible: Information Team Manager

Start date: August 2023

End date: September 2023

Review: Information Team Manager interviewing for an admin assistant and will setup this process.

Current status: Update to follow.