Water Industry Commission for Scotland: EIR release

Information requested

Information related to the Water Industry Commission for Scotland (WICS).

1. All correspondence, including internal correspondence between WICS, Audit Scotland and/or the Scottish Government about the expenses built up by WICS over the last two years, dating from January 1 2023 until the date of this FOI.

2. When did the Scottish Government find out about the expenses submitted by WICs of £77,350 for the Harvard Business School course attended by chief operating officer Michelle Ashford, and what were the reasons behind this being accepted as an expense?

• All correspondence sent between both organisations about this expense.

3. All correspondence, including internal correspondence, between the WICS and the Scottish Government, regarding the resignation of Alan Sutherland, from between December 1 2023 until the date of this FOI.

4. When did the Scottish Government find out about the resignation of Alan Sutherland?

5. How much money has been spent on WICS by the Scottish Government in 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023, with a breakdown of these costs?

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.

I have responded to each of your requests below.

1. All correspondence, including internal correspondence between WICS, Audit Scotland and/or the Scottish Government about the expenses built up by WICS over the last two years, dating from January 1 2023 until the date of this FOI.

2. When did the Scottish Government find out about the expenses submitted by WICs of £77,350 for the Harvard Business School course attended by chief operating officer Michelle Ashford, and what were the reasons behind this being accepted as an expense?

• All correspondence sent between both organisations about this expense.

I enclose a copy of most of the information you requested. As detailed in the attachments, the answer to question 2 is on page 1 of the release.

Some of the information you have requested is available from https://www.auditscotland.gov.uk/publications/the-202223-audit-of-the-water-industry-commission-for-scotland. 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. If, however, you do not have internet access to obtain this information from the website listed, then please contact me again and I will send you a paper copy.

3. All correspondence, including internal correspondence, between the WICS and the Scottish Government, regarding the resignation of Alan Sutherland, from between December 1 2023 until the date of this FOI.

4. When did the Scottish Government find out about the resignation of Alan Sutherland?

I enclose a copy of most of the information you requested. As detailed in the attachments, the answer to question 4 is on page 14 of the release.

5. How much money has been spent on WICS by the Scottish Government in 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023, with a breakdown of these costs?

The answer to your question is £0. As detailed in its annual report and accounts, laid before Parliament and published on its website at https://wics.scot/publications/our-performance/annualreports-financial-statements, WICS is funded by a levy on Scottish Water and Licensed Providers.

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance we are unable to provide some of the information you have requested because an exception under regulation 10(4)(e) (internal communications) of the EIRs applies to that information. The reason why that exception applies is that some of the documents involve internal communications between officials and Ministers.

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 for specific elements of the advice - it is clearly in the public interest that Ministers can properly answer Parliamentary questions, provide sound information to Parliament (to which they are accountable), and robustly defend the Government’s policies and decisions. They need full and candid advice from officials to enable them to do so. Premature disclosure of this type of information could lead to a reduction in the comprehensiveness and frankness of such advice and views in the future, which would not be in the public interest. However, we recognise that there is public interest in the topic of WICS's Annual Report and Accounts and therefore the factual material contained in the internal communications has been provided. Redaction of internal communications relates to pages 9, 10 and 18. All other redactions relate to personal information.

An exception under regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information) applies to all 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.

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 202300391054 - Information Released - Annex

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