Publication - FOI/EIR release

23 October 2019 meeting Education Scotland and ADES: FOI Review

Published: 26 February 2020
Directorate: Learning Directorate
Topic: Education, Public sector
FOI reference: FOI/202000016380
Date received: 3 February 2020
Date responded: 20 February 2020

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

Information requested

Further to my letter of 3 February, I have now completed my review of our response to your request under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA) for "information regarding the 23 October 2019 meeting involving the Scottish Government (including Deputy First Minister), Education Scotland and ADES".

Response

I have concluded that the original decision should be modified.

Information to be released
The modifications relate to removing exemptions originally applied to the information within the scope of your request. Specifically, the review has found that:

All information within the scope of your request (found in Enclosures 02-1, 06-1, 13-1 and 15-1) that was originally withheld under section 30 (b) (ii) FOISA (free and frank exchange of views) should now be released.
Information about SQA Course Summary reports (which can be found in Enclosures 06-1 and 15-1) that was originally withheld under section 25(1) FOISA (information otherwise accessible) should now be released, as it is not an exact copy of the information on the SQA website that was initially thought to engage this exemption; and
all information included in Enclosure 13-2 that was originally withheld under section 29 FOISA (formulation or development of policy) should be released

In reaching these conclusions, I have had regard to the announcement by the Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills, in a Ministerial statement on 6th February, that he intends to publish an outline of the information that was gathered as part of analysis of the 2019 Exam Diet results.

The additional information that can be released to you as a result of the review is included with this letter. The documents are detailed in the Annex to this letter.

Annex

INDEX OF ENCLOSURES

Document description	Explanations of changes from previously issued version
Enclosure 02-1: ADES Analysis Paper following Deputy First Minister's commission.	Some information originally withheld under section 30(b)(ii) (free and frank exchange of views). All redactions have now been removed.
Enclosure 06-1: SQA analysis paper following Deputy First Minister's commission.	Some information originally withheld under section 30(b)(ii) (free and frank exchange of views), section 25(1) (information otherwise accessible), and section 29(1)(a) (formulation or development of Scottish Government policy). All redactions have now been removed.
Enclosure 13-1: Education Scotland analysis paper (1) following Deputy First Minister's commission.	Some information originally withheld under section 30(b)(ii) (free and frank exchange of views). All redactions have now been removed
Enclosure 13-2: Education Scotland analysis paper (2) following Deputy First Minister's commission.	All information originally withheld under section 29(1)(a) (formulation or development of Scottish Government policy). All redactions have now been removed.
Enclosure 15-1: Scottish Government Analysis summary.	Some information initially withheld under section 30(b)(ii) (free and frank exchange of views) and 25(1) information otherwise accessible. All redactions have now been removed

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.