Scottish Water pay review, transformation, modernisation reward foundation: EIR release

Information requested

• Any reports or correspondence from Scottish Water to Scottish Government Ministers and/or civil servants on the subject of the Scottish Water pay review/transformation/modernisation reward foundation and in particular any report to Minister and civil servants that outlines the planned approach to trade union engagement.
• Any correspondence /reports from Scottish Government Ministers and/or civil servants on the on the subject of the Scottish Water pay review/transformation/modernisation reward foundation and in particular any report to Minister and civil servants that outlines the planned approach to trade union engagement.
• A copy of any internal correspondence/reports on the subject of the Scottish Water pay review/transformation/modernisation reward foundation and in particular any report to Minister and civil servants that outlines the planned approach to trade union engagement.

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.

Response to your request

I enclose a copy of most of the information you requested.

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.

An exception under regulation 10(4)(e) of the EIRs applies to some of the information you have requested. Regulation 10(4)(e) applies to internal communications. Some of the information you have requested is
internal communications between officials and Ministers.

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. We recognise that there is some public interest in release because we aim to be an open and transparent government. However, this is outweighed by the public interest in ensuring there is a private space to allow discussion between officials and Ministers to aid decision making.

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.

EIR 202300385228 - Information Released - Annex

File type

114 page PDF

File size

3.6 MB