Sheriff Hutton Parish Council

The complainant has requested from Sheriff Hutton Parish Council (‘the Parish Council’) all information and correspondence it held relating to a variation to planning application that he had submitted to North Yorkshire Council. The Parish Council disclosed most of the requested information, but it withheld individual councillors’ names and email addresses. It also withheld correspondence on the application it had received from a member of the public. It cited section 41 (Information provided in confidence) of FOIA for these redactions. During the Commissioner’s investigation, the Parish Council reconsidered the request under the EIR and confirmed it was relying on regulation 13(1) (Personal data) to withhold the information, which it considered to be the personal data of third parties. The Commissioner’s decision is that the Parish Council was entitled to rely on regulation 13(1) to refuse to disclose the withheld information.