Information pertaining to sea lice: EIR release

Information requested

Your request was submitted as a follow up to a previous request and response – FoI 202100244449 and asked for all information held by Marine Scotland’s Fish Health Inspectorate (FHI) in relation to sea lice and mortality events concerning the Dawnfresh Loch Etive sites from 28/09/21 to 18/10/21 and was to include any unpublished FHI reports of inspections.

Response

I attach a copy of most of the information you have requested.

In addition, there may also be some information which is relevant to your request which is publicly available from a number of resources including:

1. Scotland’s Aquaculture website – in the case of published sea lice data:

http://aquaculture.scotland.gov.uk/

2. The Scottish Government website with respect to published mortality event data and completed case information:

https://www.gov.scot/collections/publication-of-fish-health-inspectorate-information/

Under regulation 6(1)(b) of the EIRs, we do not have to give you information which is already publicly available and easily accessible to you in another form or format. 

An exception under regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information) applies to some of the information requested because it is personal data of a third party 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 exception 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 exception. In this case the redaction of individual’s names, telephone numbers, job titles and signatures has been applied.

A number of incomplete FHI case sheets (cases 20210391; 20210392; 20210393; and 2021-0394) have been released as part of the response with redactions applied in relation to regulation 11(2) as detailed above. As a result, this information may change slightly and may be added to significantly, but on completion this will be published on the Scottish Government website as detailed above.

I should also highlight that we hold a copy of a draft enforcement notice and associated communications in relation to the sites Etive 4 (FS1112) and Etive 6 (FS1288). This was drafted in case it was required following the issuing of advisory and warning letters. As it transpired, the Enforcement
Notice was surplus to requirements as Dawnfresh had met the necessary requirements complying with the current sea lice regulatory regime prior to the point at which the notice would have been issued. As a result this has not been released as part of this response.

Due to the size of the files we are unable to upload the documents referred to above. If you wish to consider, please contact us at the address below and we will be happy to provide them.

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.