Minister for Agriculture and Connectivity correspondence regarding withdrawn whole farm plan regulations: EIR release

Information requested

1. Correspondence between Jim Fairlie and his officials relating to the withdrawn whole farm plan regulations?

2. Correspondence between Jim Fairlie and/or his officials and clerks of the Scottish Parliament relating to the withdrawn whole farm plan regulations?

3. Correspondence between Jim Fairlie and/or his officials and Parliament lawyers concerning the withdrawn whole farm plan regulations?

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 pubic 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.

Please see enclosed documents numbered 1 to 8.

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance we are unable to provide some of the information you have requested as detailed below.

1. An exception under regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information) applies. This information has been redacted 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.

2. An exception under regulation 10(4)(e) (internal communications) of the EIRs applies. The reason why that exception applies is explained in the Annex to this letter.

3. An exception under regulation 10(5)(d) (confidentiality of proceedings) of the EIRs applies. The reason why that exception applies is explained in the Annex to this letter.

4. Some of the information you have requested will be available from the Scottish Parliament website at https://www.parliament.scot/~/media/committ/9620/Instrument-responses. 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.

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.

EIR 202500448379 - Information Released - Documents 1-8

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PDF

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345.3 kB

EIR 202500448379 - Information Released - Annex

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PDF

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89.3 kB