Results for Edinburgh collected from Scotland Place Standard Tool: EIR release

FOI reference: FOI/19/00029  
Date received: 27 December 2018
Date responded: 25 January 2019

 

 

You asked for results collected from the Scotland Place Standard Tool, specifically the Place Standard indicator ratings and any supporting text collected for places within Edinburgh.

 

 

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 in the attached documents, as listed below:
 Excel Spreadsheet – PS-EIR-Responses Edinburgh
 Excel Spreadsheet – Queensferry notes
 Powerpoint slides – PS-EIR-Slides Edinburgh
 PDF document - CECPlaceStandardFINALDRAFToutputslowres20180118.compressed
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. Therefore we are refusing your request under the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs. The reasons why that exception applies are explained below.

 

 

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.

The Scottish Government does not have all of the information you have requested because we hold only the Place Standard results collected through the online version of the tool, www.placestandard.scot, and through the associated App.

This information is held on a database and the results held for Edinburgh are included in the attached Excel spreadsheet. Material gathered by third parties through the use of the hard copy paper version of the tool is not held by the Scottish Government. Additionally, data collected by third parties through other methods is not collected by the Scottish Government.

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 Place Standard results for the Edinburgh area, clearly we cannot provide information which we do not hold.

 

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