Economy and Fair Work Committee meeting briefing notes: EIR release

Information requested

Copies of all briefing notes prepared and sent to MSPs by the Scottish Government or its agencies regarding the Economy and Fair Work Committee meeting on the 13th December.

A circulation list of who was sent the briefing.

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.

Materials retained on our internal records system relating to your request are enclosed in ANNEX A. Regulation 10(5)(a) of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs) has been applied to these materials. As the exception is conditional we have applied the ‘public interest test’. This means we have, in all the circumstances of this case, considered if the public interest in disclosing 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. We recognise that there may be some public interest in information about correspondence between Scottish Government officials, advisors and Ministers and Petroineos on the topic of the Grangemouth Oil Refinery. However, this is outweighed by the public interest in disclosing information that is likely to prejudice international relations, defence, national security or public safety.

Regulation 10(5)(e) of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs) has also been applied to these materials. As the exception is conditional we have applied the ‘public interest test’. This means we have, in all the circumstances of this case, considered if the public interest in disclosing 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. We recognise that there may be some public interest in information about correspondence between Scottish Government officials, advisors and Ministers and Petroineos on the topic of the Grangemouth Oil Refinery. However, this is outweighed by the public interest in disclosing information that is likely to compromise the confidentiality of commercially sensitive information related to the business.

Regulation 11 of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs) has also been applied to these materials. This has been applied to protect the personal information of individuals connected to your request for information.

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.

EIR 202300389667 - Information Released - Annex

File type

74 page PDF

File size

823.7 kB