Establishment of the Centre for Teaching Excellence: FOI Review

Information requested

Original request 202300381669

A range of information relating to the recent announcement by the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills of a Centre for Teaching Excellence, including: consideration of the policy, decisionmaking, engagement/consultation, costings and role: and for communications related to these (both internal and external).

Response

I have now completed my review of our response to your request under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA) for a review of the government’s handling of several requests, the responses to which have been issued under a single reference: 202300381669. Your requests, which were submitted as a single email, were as follows:

Request 1
1. On what date was the establishment of the CTE first proposed?
2. Who initially proposed the policy and in what context (a meeting, an email exchange, a formal briefing, a report etc)?
3. On what date was the decision made to announce the establishment of the CTE?
4. How long does the government expect it to take to establish the Centre for Teaching Excellence?

Request 2
1. How much does the government expect it to cost to establish the Centre for Teaching Excellence? (NB this would include estimated figures, such as those calculated when decided whether or not to proceed with the policy, and should not be restricted only to formal, finalised cost projections)
2. How much does the government expect it to cost to run the Centre for Teaching Excellence on an annual basis? (NB this would include estimated figures, such as those calculated when decided whether or not to proceed with the policy, and should not be restricted only to formal, finalised cost projections)
3. How much government time has been spent on developing this proposal so far?

Request 3
1. Confirmation as to whether the government intends to have the CTE replace an existing body or whether it will be established in additional to existing bodies
2. Any available details showing the likely remit of the CTE and its likely relationship with other bodies (NB this would include planning and draft materials, such as those used when deciding whether not to proceed with the policy, and should not be restricted only to formal, finalised decisions on remit and relationships).

Request 4
1. Confirmation of any meetings or discussions held with external individuals or organisations regarding the CTE, or at which the CTE was discussed. Please provide dates, locations, attendees, and confirmation of whether or not each of the meetings were minuted.
2. Any communication between the government and external individuals or organisations regarding, referring or relating to the CTE.

Request 5
1. All communication involving the Education Secretary, Special Advisers, press officers and officials regarding, referring or relating to the CTE. Please note that this includes communication regarding the response to the announcement, including the handling of the press request that I sent on 18/10/2023 from the email address jmcemedia@gmail.com to Daniel Morrow.

I have concluded that the original decision should be confirmed, with modifications.

Responses to your specific questions

I have considered your original questions, the response provided, your review response and on what basis you were unhappy. I have reviewed the searches that were conducted to identify the information requested and have identified no further relevant information held by the Scottish Government which would be relevant in answering your questions other than what was provided in the original response. I am satisfied that the searches conducted were adequate and proportionate and have identified all information held.

I apologise again that the original response was issued late. This was a complicated FOI involving a number of different elements which led to the delay. You asked a number of questions about the specifics of how the response was managed:

• Which date the material for my response was gathered
• How long was spent redacting material, and
• How long it took for a minister or SpAd to sign off.
• I would also like confirmation on that final point – was the request awaiting sign off from a minister, a SpAd, or both?

Responses to FOIs are cleared at official level or Ministerial level according to the criteria set out in the criteria for decision making and the response to this request was cleared at Ministerial level.

As an organisation we always strive to issue FOI responses in line with the statutory deadline and responsibility for meeting that statutory deadline sits with the organisation as a whole rather than different sections or parties within it.

Review of exemptions and the public interest test

I have reconsidered the exemptions applied, reviewing all the information on a line by line basis. My conclusions on the application of each exemption are set out below.

Section 29(1)(a) (policy formulation)

An exemption under section 29(1)(a) of FOISA (formulation or development of government policy) was applied to some of the information requested because it relates to the formulation of the Scottish Government’s policy on the Centre for Teaching Excellence, which is still ongoing. While an announcement about the policy intention has been made, there is still a significant amount of policy development work being undertaken, which warrants a private space in which to have those discussions between officials and with Ministers on policy options and implications.

This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’ and in general I agree with the original response conclusions and rationale in this respect. Taking account of all the circumstances of this case, I have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. I have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption. I recognise that there is a public interest in disclosing information as part of open, transparent and accountable government, and to inform public debate. However, there is a greater public interest in high quality policy and decision-making, and in the properly considered implementation and development of policies and decisions. This means that Ministers and officials need to be able to consider all available options and to debate those rigorously, to fully understand their possible implications. Their candour in doing so will be affected by their assessment of whether the discussions on the Centre for Teaching Excellence will be disclosed in the near future, when it may undermine or constrain the Government’s view on that policy while it is still under discussion and development.

There is one piece of information that I feel should not have been exempted from release, as it is already in the public domain:

- document 5, p.10 of the original response – the relevant section is replicated in Annex A. In addition, the exemption relevant to the rest of the section should be s.30(b)(ii) (free and frank advice) rather than s.29(1)(a).

There are three further areas which have been exempted on the basis of section 29(1)(a) which I believe are subject to different handling:

- document 2, page 3 of the original response – the relevant section is replicated in Annex B which is out of scope of your request and is therefore not exempt under section 29(1)(a);

- document 14, page 32 of the original response – the relevant section is replicated in Annex C is now exempted under section 30(b)(ii).

- document 14, page 32 of the original response – the relevant section is replicated in Annex D is now exempted under section 30(b)(ii).

Section 29 (1)(b) (ministerial communications)

On review I have concluded that this exemption does not apply to any of the information that has been withheld. Therefore, I am withdrawing our reliance on this exemption in relation to Document 15.

However, I believe the document should be exempted on the basis of section 30(b)(ii), the rationale for which is set out in general terms in the section 30(b)(ii) section below:

- document 15, page 37 of the original response – the relevant section is replicated in Annex E.

Section 30 (b)(ii) (free and frank exchange of view)

Exemptions under section 30(b)(ii) of FOISA (free and frank advice) were applied to some of the information requested. These exemptions apply because disclosure would, or would be likely to, inhibit substantially the free and frank exchange of views for the purposes of deliberation. I agree with the vast majority of applications of the exemptions. This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’ and I agree with the original response conclusions and rationale.

This exemption applies because disclosure would, or would be likely to, inhibit substantially the free and frank exchange of views for the purposes of deliberation. This exemption recognises the need for Ministers and officials to have a private space within which to discuss and explore options before the Scottish Government reaches a settled public view. Disclosing the content of free and frank discussions on the Centre for Teaching Excellence will substantially inhibit such discussions in the future, particularly because these discussions are still ongoing and not all decisions have been taken.

This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, I have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. I have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption. We recognise that there is a public interest in disclosing information as part of open, transparent and accountable government, and to inform public debate. However, there is a greater public interest in allowing Ministers and officials a private space within which to explore and refine the Government’s policy position. This private thinking space is essential to enable all options to be properly considered, so that good policy decisions can be taken. Premature disclosure is likely to undermine the full and frank discussion of issues between Ministers and officials, which in turn will undermine the quality of the policy making process, which would not be in the public interest.

There is one area where I disagreed with the use of the exemption:

- document 2, page 3 of the original response – this information is out of scope of your request, so is not exempt under section 30(b)(ii). The relevant section is replicated in Annex F.

Section 38 (1)(b) (personal information)

I have reviewed the information withheld under this exemption and am satisfied that it has been applied to the names of junior officials only with one exception. The vast majority of names of senior officials, Ministers and Special Advisors have been released where they appear in the information. Therefore, I am satisfied that this exemption was largely applied appropriately and that release of the information withheld 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. As set out in our initial response, this exemption is not subject to the public interest test.

The one exception relates to document 8 – an amended version of that document is replicated at Annex G.

Documents in scope

In addition to the documents already provided in the original response, I have identified one further document which I believe to be in scope and is held on the corporate record. This is attached at Annex H and is correspondence between a press officer and officials about answering a press enquiry about the Centre for Teaching Excellence. I have applied the following exemptions:

- s38(1)(b) as disclosure of names/contact details of officials 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 I am not required to consider if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption.
- Information out of scope.

There was one omission from the original response, which was to provide an email address through which to request a review – apologies for that oversight. This mistake has been flagged to the team who provided the original response so they can avoid this error in future.

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 202300389692 - Information released - Annexes

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