COP27 details: costs and staff involved: FOI review

Information requested

• The total cost of the First Minister’s visit to Egypt for COP27,
• How many staff or officials accompanied her,
• Who authorised the £5m funding for loss and damage.

Response

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance the Scottish Government does not have some of the information you have requested. We have answered your questions where possible and explained where we are unable to do that at this time.

The £5m announcement for funding to address loss and damage was approved in the first week of November 2022. The approval process was subject to a number of steps; officials requested approval from the Director-General for Net-Zero and the Permanent Secretary. Upon receiving approval from the Permanent Sectary, officials requested approval from the Minister for Environment and Land Reform. She approved the request on 3rd November 2022.

The information on officials attendance and cost is currently incomplete. We are collating the information and aim to publish it by 31st January 2023.

This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not currently hold the information you have requested.

An exemption under section 27(1) of FOISA applies to some of the information requested because we aim to publish that information by 31st January 2023 which is within 12 weeks of the date of your request. We consider that it is reasonable to withhold the information until that date, rather than release some of this routinely published information before the planned publication date. 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. We recognise that there is some public interest in releasebecause the Scottish Government should provide information about its presence at COP, and this will be met by our planned publication. In the meantime, there is a greater public interest in taking the time necessary to ensure the information has been properly collated and checked before it is published as planned. Also, we see no public interest in disrupting our programme of work to release the information ahead of the intended publication date as we would only be providing partial 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.