FOI Appeal Decision Bexley May 2007
June 23, 2007
This was a pair of appeals to the Information Tribunal against a decision by the Information Commissioner that LB of Bexley should release address details of long-term empty properties to a member of the public under an FOI request. The FOI applicatnt was appealing to get the owner's address information. The Council was appealing against the Commissioner's decision that they shoudl release property address information.
The Tribunal decided that the addresses of empty properties constituted "personal information" and that disclosure would thus be a breach of Data Protection principles. This did not apply to properties owned by organisations - so these could still be disclosed.
There is lots of interesting testimony from experts about the relationship of empty homes and crime. Interpretations of different sections of the FOI Act and Data Protection act are also of interest.
