Briefing on Wildlife Management and Muirburn Bill for Rural Affairs and Islands Committee: EIR release

Information requested

Briefing documents given to Gillian Martin on the Wildlife Management and Muirburn Bill for the Rural Affairs and Islands committee on 28 June 2023.

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.

Response

We have provided most of the information you have requested.

Exceptions under regulation 10(4)(e) of the EIRs (internal communications) applies to some of the information you have requested because it is a) internal communication between Scottish Government Ministers and officials about the Wildlife Management and Muirburn Bill in Scotland, and b) internal communication about press lines/lines to take.

These exceptions are 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 these exceptions. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding these exceptions. We recognise that there is a public interest in disclosing information as part of open, transparent and accountable government, and to inform public debate.

For a) there is also a greater public interest in high quality policy and decision-making, and in the properly considered implementation and development of policies and decisions. This means that Ministers and officials need to be able to consider all available options and to debate those rigorously, to fully understand their possible implications. Their candour in doing so will be affected by their assessment of whether the discussions on the Wildlife Management and Muirburn Bill in Scotland will be disclosed in the near future, when it may undermine or constrain the Government’s view on that policy while it is still under discussion and development.

For b) there is a greater public interest in allowing a private space within which officials can provide free and frank advice and views to Ministers in press lines/lines to take. It is clearly in the public interest that Ministers can properly answer and robustly defend the Government’s policies and decisions. They need full and candid advice from officials to enable them to do so. Premature disclosure of this type of iinformation could lead to a reduction in the comprehensiveness and frankness of such advice and views in the future, which would not be in the public interest.

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.

202300364199_Wildlife Management and Muirburn Bill - Stage 1 ministerial evience session - briefing (final version)

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