Publication - FOI/EIR release

Correspondence between Scottish Government, SEPA and Scottish Water relating to sewer overflows: EIR release

Published: 11 September 2023
Directorate: Energy and Climate Change Directorate
Part of: Environment and climate change, Public sector
FOI reference: FOI/202300347760
Date received: 17 March 2023
Date responded: 17 April 2023

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

Information requested

All email correspondence since January 1, 2022 between the government, SEPA and Scottish Water that relates to spills or overflow events at combined sewer overflows (CSOs) in Scotland, including to the collating of said information for future publication.

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.

Response to your request

I enclose a copy of the information you requested. Please note that some of the files have been partially redacted as sections were not within scope of your request i.e. they were not emails between the government, SEPA and Scottish Water. There are 5 files, please let me know if you do not receive them all.

Some of the information you have requested is available from https://www.parliament.scot/-/media/files/committees/net-zero-energy-and-transportcommittee/correspondence/2022/20221031_sepa_supplementary_evidence.pdf and https://www.scottishwater.co.uk/help-and-resources/document-hub/key-publications/urban-watersimprovements. Under regulation 6(1)(b) of the EIRs, we do not have to give you information which is already publicly available and easily accessible to you in another form or format. If, however, you do not have internet access to obtain this information from the websites listed, then please contact me again and I will send you a paper copy.

An exception under regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information) applies to all of the information requested because it 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.