Site inspection records, grant claims and correspondence for new forestry plantations near Huntly: EIR release

Information requested

Could you please provide any site inspection records, grant claims and related correspondence for two new forestry plantations near Huntly:

• New Noth Woodland Creation
• Red Craig Woodland Creation

Could you also provide any correspondence between Scottish Forestry and Huntly Development Trust for the past 4 years.

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.

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 11(2) of the EIRs (personal data relating to a third party) and 10(5)(e) of the EIRs (commercial confidentiality) applies to some of the information you have requested. This information has been redacted on the requested correspondence.

For further detail on the application of these exceptions, please see Annex A below.

Due to the size of the files we are unable to upload the documents referred to above. If you wish to consider, please contact us at the address below and we will be happy to provide.

ANNEX A

REASONS FOR NOT PROVIDING INFORMATION

Personal data relating to third party

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

Commercial confidentiality

An exception under regulation 10(5)(e) of the EIRs (commercial confidentiality) applies to some of the information requested because it would make public information on a business case that was prepared by a third party individual.

This exception is subject to the ‘public interest test’. In this instance we consider that there may be a public interest in disclosing this information as it may contribute to the transparency of decision making within the Huntly Development Trust, but that this interest is outweighed by the public interest arising from ensuring a business (the third party supplier) may be supplied as part of a tendering process can remain commercially competitive for future work and this is in the public interest.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.