The Resident Who Asked Too Much
(Of South Hams District Council)
After requesting information held by my council behind a form of Freedom of Information (specifically called EIR- ‘Environmental Information Regulation’) and asking questions of South Hams councillors with key responsibilities regarding the Freeport, on the 18th April 2024 I received an unusual email from South Hams Council.
In it, South Hams Council stated that
“any future request relating to the Freeport will not be answered”
Following a number of submitted FOI requests and requests for clarity to Councillors on the Freeport, my council has decided:
“When considering your requests further consideration has been given to ICO guidance which indicates that requests may be considered a manifestly unreasonable demand on public resources when “made by one person, or by different persons who appear to the public authority to be acting in concert or in pursuance of a campaign”.
For the avoidance of doubt, this means that any future request relating to the Freeport will not be answered. Should you wish to request information on a different subject, your request will be processed accordingly.”
PUBLIC RIGHT TO INFORMATION?
Imagine if you were a Dartmoor organisation who had to submit Freedom of Information requests about a concerning development on the moor- only to be told you will not be answered…
Imagine if you were part of a teacher’s union seeking unreleased information on school building safety and were told that your requests will not be answered…
What if you needed to ask your council hard questions about the safety of a privately operated customs site for military vehicles on your doorstep?
Or you were concerned about the growth of heavy goods traffic on South Hams roads?
Or you wanted reassurance in the form of actual documentation on a new testing site for defence technology given regulatory flexibility by the freeport?
It seems that anyone- individual or group- who asks too many questions and submits ‘too many’ Freedom of Information requests (because that is the only route available for accessing some specific information), runs the risk of not being responded to, as they may be construed by South Hams Council as being in pursuance of a ‘campaign.’
FORCED TO ASK
There is a concerning issue here about accountability and transparency.
If South Hams does not readily make documents publicly available, then people have to submit Freedom of Information requests to see them.
And the more information that is held behind this ‘FOI wall’, the more documents there are for people to request.
What is the real cost of withheld information?
If South Hams is prepared to be involved with such a complex public/private project as the Freeport (pushed forward without public consultation with its residents) and then hold the information behind FOI, it still needs to abide by the Nolan principles of public life- openness and accountability.
And if it claims that it cannot afford to do that, it shouldn’t really be involved with the project. Costs for transparency and scrutiny should have been factored in. If accountability and openness has not been accounted for, the council is not abiding by the Nolan principles as it cannot fully meet them.
Yes, there is a cost for processing information held behind Freedom of Information. But the truth is these costs are completely insignificant compared to the officer and council time spent on the Plymouth Freeport project by South Hams Council – even in its earliest stages (it’s a 25 year scheme). To compare costs of accessing information against unquantified council officer time – no ‘time sheets’ apparently- plus an ’investment’ of £3.5 million AT LEAST seems deeply disingenuous.
And, meanwhile, Plymouth Freeport and South Hams Council have taken literally years to release information. 3 years to be precise in one case.
Take the case of the original Plymouth Freeport Bid that was only just released to me on 26th April 2024, three years after its submission way back in February 2021. It took requests from myself to get this bid document released. My own council (South Hams District Council- S.H.D.C.) – a founding member of the Freeport no less! – failed to do it. It has failed me and its other residents in transparency and accountability.
This ‘Freeport Bid’ is a key document: it contains the ‘rationale’ for the 75km boundary (see my article ‘The Dartmoor Document’) as well as important contextual information relevant to residents and organisations right across the South West regarding regulation ‘innovation’, customs, tax sites and ‘benefits’ to South Hams (there seem to be very, very few of these apparent to me in the bid document).
The ‘Freeport Bid document’ is information that should long ago have been given to Dartmoor National Park, South Devon National Landscape, countless other organisations, and – lest we forget- the residents (us) who are helping bankroll the scheme.
And now, with its release after 3 years, the Freeport Bid document comes with a disclaimer:
“Please be aware that except for the outer boundary rationale, a lot of the information contained within the Original Bid Document is now out of date and should not be relied upon.”
EXPIRED
Is being ‘three years out of date’ the best we should expect?
There is plenty of information related to Plymouth Freeport that could do with release. And there are other issues that need public exploration; for example the timeline and details around Langage hydrogen, a 9 km hydrogen pipe to china clay mines and South Ham’s audit & governance report that, for a reason South Hams Council has failed so far to explain, seems to have been lacking pertinent and possibly very important information that the council should have been privy to. Or perhaps it was. But no-one will now explain it- at least not to me.
Perhaps we’ll find out in another three years’ time?
TOO MUCH?
As information was held behind FOI, I simply asked for it. Why not just release it all as a matter of course so we don’t have to ask? It seems highly cynical for a council to refuse to answer further questions on the Freeport when even Plymouth Freeport’s own Chair, Jan Ward, stated to MPs that transparency has been an issue of note:
“If I am honest, I think we probably could have done better on public consultation and transparency at the outset”: Plymouth Freeport Chair, Jan Ward, to the Business and Trade Committee
Tuesday 21 November 2023
Her comment is a formidable understatement. I’ve submitted 9 requests for Freeport information held behind ‘Freedom of Information/ EIR’ to my council. I’ve put questions to South Hams that were never responded to at all.
Don’t get me wrong, I am glad there has been a step in the right direction, with some documents being released by Plymouth Freeport itself that shed some faint light on the decisions being taken on our behalf by our councils. Despite the fact it has taken 3 years in the case of the Freeport Bid document, this move towards some transparency is not only well received, but very necessary.
Unlike the wonderment of ancient starlight that reaches earth revealing the origins of the universe, waiting for Freeport information to reach us across the years is, frankly, unnacceptable. Especially when residents are expected to put so much trust in a project that is so far so poorly explained and seemingly always in retrospect. We – the residents- seem always to be the last to know.
EVIDENCE OF PUBLIC INTEREST
Sadly, the South Hams Council ‘Freeport team’ has been notably absent from ‘public questions’ events on the Freeport over the past year.
Granted, there is a South Hams Council mechanism by which the public can pose a 50 word pre-written question in Council, but it’s hopelessly straight-jacketed: there is no follow up question permitted. It enables councillors to respond with a politically expedient statement that most often doesn’t even address the question, and usually begs more. But the South Hams ‘Freeport team’ did take questions at the South Hams Society AGM at Totnes’ Seven Stars on 25th April. At this event the South Hams representative for Plymouth Freeport, Cllr John Birch, and Director of Place & Enterprise, council officer Chris Brook, responded to public questions alongside Plymouth Freeport CEO Richard May.
What followed was an hour and a quarter of non-stop questions, an outpouring of queries, concerns and clear proof of how much people still need to know about the Freeport based on the little information they’ve been given. It clearly could have gone on far longer- and that was just a room of some thirty odd people.
Imagine if South Hams had actually consulted about the Freeport with residents in the first place? Imagine if they hadn’t kept information behind FOI/ EIR, and that all questions had been responded to, and public Q&As held over the past year?
It’s clear there is a desperate need for clarity and information.
Sharing key information for public knowledge at an early stage is something Plymouth Freeport should have done, something South Hams Council should have done, and something councillors should have done long ago. Was it really too much to ask my council for transparency and clarity? A District Council is, after all, meant to be publicly accountable.
On 30th April, Plymouth Freeport assured me the Bid Document will be released on their website for everyone to view soon. I will analyse and write about this document from the past to see what it says about the future for us and the Freeport.
In the meantime, read about the journey of the ‘Freeport Bid document’ from submission in 2021 (to UK Government) to release in 2024. Read it here in my article ‘Best Before End: a Timeline of Disclosure for the Plymouth Freeport Bid’
No democratic accountability? Who is getting the taxpayer’s hard earned money here? and who is making this happen. Smells whiffy to me!
I live nowhere near your area, but thank you for highlighting this. It appears that the country is being sold off piecemeal behind our backs, with no recourse for citizens living in those areas. Surely ,anti-democatic and grossly underhand?
It’s an outrage! How dare they institute a freeport (massive challenge to local democracy and revenue) and then hide – all the while ignoring taxpayers? An absolute scam. The Lib Dems at HQ level have apparently said they’re against freeports but local reps have clearly thrown their lot in with it
I think the Councils should go for total transparency with regular reports made available to the public, and public meetings. I feel many Councillors are very hazy about the implications of Freeports, and hardly know what is going on.