First Minister's Christmas card list: FOI release

Information request and response under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002.


Information requested

  1. A full list of recipients receiving a Christmas card from the First Minister in 2022.
  2. Total number of Christmas cards sent in 2022.
  3. Total cost of the Christmas cards in 2022.
  4. The standard message within the Christmas card in 2022.

Response

  1. I enclose a list of the organisations, foreign leaders and dignitaries received a Christmas Card from the First Minister on behalf of the Scottish Government. In addition to those organisations listed, the First Minister typically sends a Christmas card to Members of the Scottish Parliament and other politicians.

An exemption under section 38(1)(b) of FOISA (personal information) applies to your request for the names of all the people who were sent a Christmas card from Nicola Sturgeon in her capacity as First Minister because some of the information requested is personal data of a third party, ie names/contact details of individuals, and disclosing it would contravene the data protection principles in Article 5(1) of the General Data Protection Regulation and in section 34(1) of the Data Protection Act 2018. This exemption is not subject to the ‘public interest test’, so we are not required to consider if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption.

  1. 1270
  2. £3513.08 including delivery
  3. Season’s Greetings Beannachdan aig àm na Nollaige

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

FOI - 202200334984 - information released

Contact

Please quote the FOI reference
Central Enquiry Unit
Email: ceu@gov.scot
Phone: 0300 244 4000

The Scottish Government
St Andrews House
Regent Road
Edinburgh
EH1 3DG

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