Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council

The complainant requested information about a noise complaint and planning/land use in respect of a piece of land near to this property. Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council (‘the Council’) applied section 14 of the FOIA to the first request and relied on the provisions of section 17(6) as the basis not to respond to the second and third requests. Following the Commissioner’s involvement the Council agreed that the requests should have been considered under the EIR as opposed to the FOIA. The Council indicated that it considered regulation 12(4)(b) to apply to two requests and 12(4)(a) to apply to all three requests. The Commissioner’s decision is that the Council correctly applied regulation 12(4)(b) to two requests and that on the balance of probabilities it does not hold any information relating to the third request and as such it applied regulation 12(4)(a) correctly. However, in failing to consider the request under the correct access regime, the Council breached regulation 11 as it did not issue a refusal notice within the statutory timescale. The Commissioner does not require any steps to be taken. Information Tribunal appeal EA/2019/0301 dismissed.