Repair work undertaken to sections of the M8: EIR release

Information requested

"Full details of all repair work that has been undertaken to section of the M8 as follows:

Eastbound carriageway of the M8 (in direction of Edinburgh) between Junction 3a and 3.

Details to include depths of all potholes present and the repair work that was undertaken to repair these.

Information to cover all repairs undertaken from 6pm on 20th December 2021 to the current day."

On 16 March you further clarified that you "would like to have full details on all the repair work that has been done to the carriageway surface over this time frame which should include all repair work to the potholes. I trust that the details provided will include all the damage (e.g depth and condition of potholes) and remedial work that was taken."

Response

As the information you have requested is 'environmental information' for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.

This exemption is subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.

Please see Annex A to this response for a copy of the inspection defect records for the time frame and location you requested. There was 6 Category 1 defects raised during safety inspections and patrols for the section of the M8 that you requested details on and these defects all received temporary repairs within 24hrs. All permanent repairs were then undertaken in accordance with contractual timescales. No Structural or Routine maintenance has been carried out on this section of the M8 for the dates requested.

Under the terms of the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs (information not held), Transport Scotland is not required to provide information which it does not have. We do not have some of the information you have requested because inspections do not routinely record the depths of potholes. Decisions are made by the inspectors on site as to whether defects are deemed to represent an immediate/imminent hazard or not and treated accordingly.

This exception is subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exception. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exception. While we recognise that there may be some public interest in information about depths of potholes, clearly we cannot provide information which we do not hold.

Further details on the definition of defects, and how they are handled, can be found at section 5.3 of the Roads Assessment Management plan. This can be found on the Transport Scotland Website at j408891-09 | Transport Scotland.

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 - 202200287705 - Information Released - Annex A

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