City of Edinburgh Council’s proposed Supplementary Guidance on Developer Contributions and Infrastructure Delivery for City Plan 2030 information: EIR release

Information requested

• Correspondence, documents or consultation responses from, or submitted to, the Planning, Architecture and Regeneration Directorate by any other Scottish Government department or directorate, public authority or local authority providing their consideration of the City of Edinburgh Council’s proposed Supplementary Guidance on Developer Contributions and Infrastructure Delivery for City Plan 2030.
• Any internal Planning, Architecture and Regeneration Directorate correspondence or documents, between officials, including but not limited to emails, notes and minutes of meetings, comments and draft documents including track changes, detailing their consideration of the City of Edinburgh Council’s proposed Supplementary Guidance on Developer Contributions and Infrastructure Delivery for City Plan 2030 and why it could not be adopted.

For the avoidance of doubt, correspondence should include but is not limited to emails, letters, agenda notes and minutes of meetings, comments and draft documents including track changes, modelling and calculations or any document which is a) held by the Scottish Government and b) related to the guidance and its consideration between 13 December 2024 and 3 February 2025.

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.

I enclose a copy of some of the information you requested.

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 website(s) listed, then please contact me again and I will send you a paper copy. Some of the information you have requested is available online at the following locations.

Copies of the information submitted by City of Edinburgh Council to Scottish Ministers on 17 December regarding the Supplementary Guidance on Developer Contributions and Infrastructure Delivery can be found at item 8.1 here.

A Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) Screening Determination in respect of the Supplementary Guidance on Developer Contributions and Infrastructure Delivery can be viewed here.

Copies of the letters issued by the Scottish Government to the City of Edinburgh Council between 13/12/2024 and 03/02/2025 can be viewed here.

We are unable to provide some of the information you have requested because exceptions under the following regulations of the EIRs apply to that information - regulation 11(2) personal data and regulation 10(4)(e) internal communications. The reasons why these exceptions apply are explained in the Annex to this letter.

ANNEX

REASONS FOR NOT PROVIDING INFORMATION

Exceptions apply

An exception under regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information) applies to some 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. The personal data have therefore been redacted from the attached information.

An exception under regulation 10(4)(e) of the EIRs (internal communications) applies to some of the information you have requested because it either includes internal communications or internal legal advice and disclosure would breach legal professional privilege. 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. We recognise that there is a public interest in disclosing information as part of open, transparent and accountable government, and to inform public debate. However, this is outweighed by the strong public interest in maintaining the right to confidentiality of communications, especially discussions at preliminary stages of consideration when private space to discuss is essential and also between legal advisers and clients, to ensure that Ministers and officials are able to receive legal advice in confidence, like any other public or private organisation.

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.

EIR 202500453451 - Information released - Annex

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