East West Railway Company Ltd

The complainant submitted a follow-up request for information from East West Rail (“EWR”) relating to meetings it held with Bedford Borough Council (“BBC”) from 2018 to date about proposed rail and station infrastructure potentially affecting the area. EWR provided a partial response to the request, but cited section 1(1) (information not held) of FOIA to eight specific ad hoc meetings and section 12(1) (cost of compliance) of FOIA for all other information held relating to the aggregated requests within a 60-day period.
The Commissioner’s decision is as follows:
On the balance of probabilities, EWR does not hold the information the complainant has requested regarding the specific ad hoc meetings, and its response complied with section 1(1) of the FOIA. And, that EWR were entitled to refuse to comply with the aggregated request under section 12(1) of FOIA (cost of compliance) for information held, and that it has complied with its obligations under section 16(1) of FOIA to provide adequate advice and assistance to the complainant. However, the Commissioner finds that EWR has breached section 10(1) of FOIA in that it failed to provide a valid response to the request within the statutory time frame of 20 working days. The Commissioner does not require EWR to take any steps.