The Freedom of Information (FOI) Act 2000 creates two important new rights of access to information held by public authorities:
These new rights of access are legally enforceable. The Act is fully retrospective and these rights therefore apply to all information, no matter how recent or how old.
Anyone whose request for information is refused or ignored has the right to ask the public authority to review that decision. Penalties can be applied to public authorities and individual officials who withhold information from the public domain without good reason.
But the new rights of access to information are also subject to some substantial and procedural limitations. These substantial limitations are known as 'exemptions' and are outlined below. If information is properly exempt, there is no right of access to it under the FOI Act. The procedural limitations are set out in the Guidance on Processing Requests.
The exemptions to the new rights of access ensure a proper balance is achieved between:
Because the rights of access are so important, any decision to refuse a request for information has be made with great care.
An introduction to exemptions, and the other FOI guidance provided by the DCA, are designed to help decision-makers to: