Correspondence relating to planning permission appeal PPA-250-2341: EIR release

Information request and response under the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004


Information requested

"Relating to planning permission appeal PPA-250-2341: Copies of all correspondence, including WhatsApp, text messages and emails, between the Scottish Government and Philip Neaves, Felsham PD. This should also include any correspondence sent to or received from Felsham PD."

Response

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.

Most of the information you have requested is available from our website at the following link : https://www.dpea.scotland.gov.uk/CaseDetails.aspx?id=121031.

I also attach 2 documents, relating to procedural/administrative queries which were received by, or sent to, Felsham PD which were not published to our website.

Please note that information within the documents provided relating to personal information such as names/signatures/email addresses have been redacted in line with our privacy policy and in accordance with regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information), because that information is personal data of a third party 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 exception 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 exception.

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.

Contact

Please quote the FOI reference
Central Enquiry Unit
Email: ceu@gov.scot
Phone: 0300 244 4000

The Scottish Government
St Andrews House
Regent Road
Edinburgh
EH1 3DG

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