Cabinet Office

The complainant asked the Cabinet Office for the contents of a National Archives file referenced ‘PREM 16/516’. The Cabinet Office withheld information under section 27(1)(a) and section 27(2) of the Act; and gave a ‘neither confirm nor deny’ response under sections 23(5) and 24(2) that any further information was held. During the course of the Commissioner’s investigation the Cabinet Office dropped the ‘neither confirm nor deny’ response, and withheld some of the information by reference to sections 23(1) and 24(1). At internal review, and also during the Commissioner’s investigation, the Cabinet Office released some of the withheld information. The Commissioner decided that some of the remaining withheld information was not exempt, and that the Cabinet Office had also breached the procedural requirements of sections 1(1)(a), 1(1)(b), 10(1), 17(1) and 17(3)(b). The Commissioner required the Cabinet Office to disclose the information which it had improperly withheld.