Scottish Forestry printer ink cartridge recycling policy: EIR release

Information request and response under the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004


Information requested

1. Whether there is a recycling policy for printer ink cartridges at this organisation. If so please provide this.
2. How many printer ink cartridges have been used by this organisation in each of the 2017-18, 2018-19 and 2019-20 financial years, broken down by each year and the office in which they were used.
3. How many printer ink cartridges have been recycled by this organisation in each of the 2017-18, 2018-19 and 2019-20 financial years , broken down the each year and the office in which they were recycled.

Response

As the information you have requested is ‘environmental information’ for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.
This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.

I enclose a copy of some of the information you requested where it is available at Annex 2, in the format you asked for.

ANNEX 1
REASONS FOR NOT PROVIDING INFORMATION
The Scottish Government does not have the information
Under the terms of the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs (information not held)
, the Scottish Government is not required to provide information which it does not have. Scottish Forestry does not hold the information/data you have requested relating to printer ink cartridges across all parts of the organisation/offices.
This exception is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exception. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exception. While we recognise that there may be some public interest in information about the use and recycling of printer ink cartridges, clearly we cannot provide information which we do not hold.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

FOI-202000020099 - Information released - Annex 2

Contact

Please quote the FOI reference
Central Enquiry Unit
Email: ceu@gov.scot
Phone: 0300 244 4000

The Scottish Government
St Andrews House
Regent Road
Edinburgh
EH1 3DG

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