Publication - FOI/EIR release

Equality Impact Assessment of proposed reductions in hours for ScotRail ticket offices: FOI release

Published: 6 December 2023
Topic: Public sector
FOI reference: 202300347213
Date received: 14 March 2023
Date responded: 14 April 2023

Information request and response under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002.

Information requested

The Equality Impact Assessment carried out in relation to the proposed reductions in hours for ScotRail ticket offices that were subject to public consultation in early 2022.

Response

In response to your request above, please see attached ScotRail’s draft DIAs.

At the time of ScotRail undertaking the DIA in September 2021, ScotRail was not in public ownership and therefore not subject to the requirement to undertake an Equality Impact Assessment (EQIA). An EQIA is the same as a DIA with ScotRail using the terminology DIA at the time of drafting the document.

At that time, ScotRail undertook the DIA as good practice.

On 07 March 2023, the former Minister for Transport, Jenny Gilruth, announced in the Scottish Parliament that the ScotRail ticket office opening hours review under schedule 17, would now form part of the Scottish Government’s National Rail Conversation (NRC).

The draft DIA has not been updated by ScotRail since September 2021 and is currently paused until the Scottish Government’s National Rail Conversation is held. It is at this point it will be reviewed and updated as required.

You will see that some of the information in the attachments has been redacted. This is in line with an exemption under Section 38 (1) (b) – Third party and personal data.

Section 38 (1) (b) – Third party and personal data.

An exemption under section 38(1)(b) of FOISA (personal information) applies to some of the information requested because it is personal data of a third party, i.e. names and contact details of individuals and companies, and disclosing it would contravene the data protection principles in Article 5(1) of the General Data Protection Regulation and in section 34(1) of the Data Protection Act 2018.

This exemption is not subject to the ‘public interest test’, so we are not required to consider if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption.

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.