Welsh and Irish Government leader documentation and Former First Minister meeting with Palestinian community correspondence: FOI release
Information request and response under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002.
Information requested
2. Could you supply all documentation held by the Scottish Government, including correspondence (internal included), minutes/notes from meetings, briefings, analysis, which mention Mark Drakeford, between December 10 2023 and March 15 2024?
3. Could you supply all documentation held by the Scottish Government, including correspondence (internal included), minutes/notes from meetings, briefings, analysis, which mention Leo Varadkar, between March 15 2024 and April 15 2024?
4. Could you provide the minutes/notes and correspondence/briefings about Humza Yousaf's meeting with the South Palestine community on April 17 2024?
Response
Request two
Searches were conducted across the email records of certain Scottish Government officials, who would be most likely to hold relevant information, along with searches of the Scottish Government’s internal system for records management. Various items of information were identified as a result of these searches, some of which is enclosed in Annex A.
We narrowed the searches of information to key individuals in those departments who were likely to hold relevant materials, as in order to fully comply with your request we would have had to conduct searches across the email records of every Scottish Government civil servant, which would not be possible to do within the upper cost limit of £600.
An exemption under section 38(1)(b) of FOISA (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 exemption 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 exemption.
Request three
Searches were conducted across the email records of certain Scottish Government officials, who would be most likely to hold relevant information, along with searches of the Scottish Government’s internal system for records management. Various items of information were identified as a result of these searches, some of which is enclosed in Annex B.
We narrowed the searches of information to key individuals in those departments who were likely to hold relevant materials, as in order to fully comply with your request we would have had to conduct searches across the email records of every Scottish Government civil servant, which would not be possible to do within the upper cost limit of £600.
An exemption under section 38(1)(b) of FOISA (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 exemption 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 exemption.
An exemption under Section 30(b)(i) and 32(1)(a)(i) applies to some of the information requested. The reason why this exemption applies is explained in Annex D of this letter.
Request 4
Information that you have requested can be found in Annex C of this document.
An exemption under section 38(1)(b) of FOISA (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 exemption 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 exemption.
An exemption under Section 30(b)(i) and S30C applies to some of the information requested. The reason why this exemption applies is explained in Annex D of this letter.
About FOI
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Contact
Please quote the FOI reference
Central Correspondence Unit
Email: contactus@gov.scot
Phone: 0300 244 4000
The Scottish Government
St Andrew's House
Regent Road
Edinburgh
EH1 3DG
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