The A82 travelling towards Fort William: EIR release

Information requested

Any complaints, reports or incidents from the19th November 2022 to 3rd December 2022. The section of road is on the A82 travelling towards Fort William. The rough area is between the Ballachulish Bridge and Onich Hotel.

I would also be interested to learn of any road improvements of this section during this time frame or to present day.

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.

For ease of reference I have split your request into separate questions

1. Complaints from 19 November 2022 to 3 December 2022. The section of road is on the A82 travelling towards Fort William.

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.

Please see Annex A to this response showing details of 2 complaints made for the location within the timeframe.

2. Reports from 19 November 2022 to 3 December 2022. The section of road is on the A82 travelling towards Fort William.

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance Transport Scotland does not have the information you have requested. Therefore we are refusing your request under the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs. This is because there were no reports concerning the A82, northbound between the Ballachulish Bridge and Onich Hotel.

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 reports made about road conditions, clearly we cannot provide information which we do not hold.

3. Incidents from 19 November 2022 to 3 December 2022. The section of road is on the A82 travelling towards Fort William.

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance Transport Scotland does not have the information you have requested. Therefore we are refusing your request under the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs. This is because there were no incidents reported for the A82, northbound between the Ballachulish Bridge and Onich Hotel.

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 incidents, clearly we cannot provide information which we do not hold.

4. Road improvements of this section during this time frame or to present day.

A maintenance scheme is currently scheduled for this area for the next Financial Year, titled A82 Ballachulish to Onich.

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 202200335492 - Information released

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