South Leverton Parish Council
- Date 21 July 2020
- Sector Local government
- Decision(s) EIR 3.2.b: Upheld, EIR 5.2: Upheld
The complainant has requested from South Leverton Parish Council (SLPC) information on work conducted by a voluntary Steering Group to create a local Neighbourhood Plan. SLPC said that the Steering Group was completely separate from SLPC and that any information that the Group held in connection with the Neighbourhood Plan was neither held by SLPC nor accessible by means of an information request to SLPC. The Commissioner’s decision is that the requested information is held by the Steering Group for SLPC’s business purposes and thus that it is ‘held’ by SLPC within the meaning of regulation 3(2)(b) of the EIR. She also finds that SLPC breached regulation 5(2) of the EIR by failing to provide its response within 20 working days. The Commissioner requires SLPC to issue a fresh response to the request under the EIR. The response should not rely on a claim that SLPC does not hold the information within the meaning of regulation 3(2)(b) of the EIR.