Correspondence on Scottish Government position on pensions in an independent Scotland: FOI release

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


Information requested

I refer to the following FOI:
https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-government-position-on-pensions-in-an-independent-scotland-foi-release/

It notes

“ The Scottish Government will publish full proposals for pensions in an independent Scotland in coming months as part of the ‘Building a New Scotland’ series, to help ensure people have the information they need to make an informed choice before a referendum.”

I note that the Building a New Scotland series of papers have now ceased with no pensions paper being produced,

I would therefore like any discussion on the date of publication of the paper and progress made on the paper and how far off completion, or if it was simply completed awaiting publication. For clarity I am not interested in the contents of the paper for these purposes just the information I have set out.

Response

Due to the broad timeframe of your request, it would not be possible to locate, retrieve and provide every single piece of information held by the Scottish Government about this topic within the upper cost limit of £600.

In the interest of providing information whenever possible, we have conducted what we consider to be the most proportionate searches that can be done within the upper cost limit.

As a result, we have limited the search to discussions relating to the last target date for publication for the Pension paper.

Some of the material you have requested is located in Annex A.

Section 30(c) (Prejudice to the Effective Conduct of Public Affairs) of FOISA applies to your request for the planned publication date of the Pension paper. The reason why this exemption applies is explained in the Annex B of this letter.

The Scottish Government has set out that a final overview independence paper, to give the people of Scotland the information they need to make an informed choice over their future, will be published. This paper will cover a range of areas, including pensions.

Prior to the decision to proceed with a single overview paper, draft content for a Building a New Scotland paper on pensions had been in development but was not progressed to the point of completion or clearance by Ministers.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

FOI 202400444508 - Information Released - Annex

Contact

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

The Scottish Government
St Andrew's House
Regent Road
Edinburgh
EH1 3DG

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