Corporate Section
UK Representation to the EU
Avenue d’Auderghem 10
1040 Brussels
Belgium
Website
: https://www.gov.uk
Vicky Cann
01 August 2018
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxx.xxx
Dear Ms Cann,
Your Freedom Of Information Request: 0536-18
Thank you again for your request for information which we received on 8 May 2018. In your
request you asked;
“Could I request a list of the lobby meetings (with representatives of companies,
organisations and other stakeholders) held by the Permanent Representative and his Deputy
in the past 6 months? As before, I would like to request a list of these meetings: who was
present at the meeting, including the names of organisations/ lobbyists present, as well as
the date of the meeting, and the subject matter discussed”.
We wrote to you on 7 June to confirm that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO)
does hold information relevant to your request but that we were considering several specific
exemptions in relation to your request, including section 27: (international relations).
The FOI Act obliges us to respond to requests promptly, and in any case no later than 20
working days after receiving your request. However, when a qualified exemption applies to
the information and the public interest test is engaged, the Act allows the time for response
to be longer than 20 working days, and a full response must be provided within such time as
is reasonable in all circumstances of the case.
We do, of course, aim to make all decisions within 20 working days, including in cases
where we need to consider where the public interest lies in respect of a request for exempt
information. In this case, however, we have not yet reached a decision on where the balance
of the public interest lies.
In your case we estimate that it will take an additional 20 days to take a decision on where
the balance of the public interest lies. Therefore, we plan to let you have a response by 30
August 2018. If it appears that it will take longer than this to reach a conclusion, we will keep
you informed. We apologise for this further delay, which has been caused by the time taken
to gather and sift through the information and the subsequent consultations with relevant
colleagues.
If you would like to request a review of our decision, or if you wish to make a complaint,
please write to the Central FOI Unit at Room WH2.177, King Charles Street, London SW1A
2AH, or by e-mail t
o xxxxxxx.xxxx@xxx.xxx.xx. Please note that you have 40 working days
from the date of this letter in which to submit a request for an internal review.
If you are not content with the outcome of your complaint, you may then apply directly to the
Information Commissioner for a decision. Generally, the Information Commissioner cannot
make a decision unless you have exhausted the complaints procedure provided by the FCO.
The Information Commissioner can be contacted at: Information Commissioner's Office,
Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF.
Please contact me if you have any queries about this letter.
Yours sincerely,
Corporate Section, UKRep
We keep and use information in line with the Data Protection Act 1998. We may release this personal information to other UK
government departments and public authorities.