British Library

The complainant has requested the number of times books by specific authors were borrowed during specific years. The above public authority’s final position was to rely on section 40(2) of FOIA to withhold the most recent year’s data and to rely on section 12 of FOIA to refuse the remainder of the request. The Commissioner’s decision is that the public authority has not applied section 40(2) of FOIA correctly and is consequently not entitled to withhold that information. The public authority is entitled to rely on section 12 of FOIA to refuse the remainder of the request. Finally the public authority breached section 17 of FOIA as it failed to issue a correct refusal notice within 20 working days. The Commissioner requires the public authority to take the following steps to ensure compliance with the legislation. Disclose the total library loans for both of the requested authors in 2022 as well as the top three most loaned titles for both individuals.
Keywords/themes: Public lending rights (PLR), annual publication