John Buchan Way plantation legal challenge: EIR release

Information requested

I am reporting on the news that the Stobo Residents Action Group will take Scottish Forestry to court over environmental concerns surrounding the development of a 700-hectare forest plantation around the John Buchan Way.

Please could I request a copy of the proposal and consultation documents, to ensure that my reporting around the possible environmental benefits and limitations of the plantation is as balanced as possible?

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

Please find attached a copy of the ‘Stobo Estate Woodland Creation Consultation’ document.

This document summarises the proposals and findings from the various surveys and other supporting documents noted in the document. Copies of these supporting documents (where these are held by Scottish Forestry) can be made available on request.

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(5)(g) of the EIRs (protection of the environment) applies to some of the information requested because it would make public the locations of nesting / breeding sites of protected species. This information has been marked and redacted in the attached document.

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 202400424360 - Information Released - Annex

File type

PDF

File size

1.9 MB