Gresham House Forest Growth and Sustainability Fund and woodland creation scheme contracts: EIR Review

Information requested

Original request 202500474203

1. Gresham House Forest Growth and Sustainability Fund LP (Company number SL034785) has purchased a few dozen sites in Scotland either already with Sitka spruce plantations, or to plant new (probably Sitka spruce) plantations, for new woodland creation schemes.

Please provide all contracts for the new woodland creation schemes, either signed, awaiting being signed, or provisional contracts subject to change (these have been provided before at pre-app stage) that have yet to be signed, that have been awarded to this fund.

2. Please provide a list of woodland creation schemes (with reference numbers) at pre-app or application stage where there is not yet a contract, in relation to this fund.

Response

Thank you for your email of 8 August 2025, in which you requested an internal review of the response you received to your request of 1 July 2025, made under the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), with the reference number 202500474203, concerning the following information you asked to be disclosed:

Gresham House Forest Growth and Sustainability Fund LP (Company number SL034785) has purchased a few dozen sites in Scotland, either already with Sitka spruce plantations or to plant new (probably Sitka spruce) plantations, for new woodland creation schemes.

Please provide all contracts for the new woodland creation schemes, either signed, awaiting being signed, or provisional contracts subject to change (these have been provided before at the pre-app stage) that have yet to be signed, that have been awarded to this fund.

Please provide a list of woodland creation schemes (with reference numbers) at the pre-app or application stage, where there is not yet a contract, in relation to this fund.

You requested a review based on the arguments listed below, asking for additional information to be released within the scope of this request, namely, ‘a provisional estimate for the cost to the taxpayer of the scheme:’

Thank you for your email, and apologies for the late response. I think I sent a follow-up email asking for the Colmslie screening opinion, at almost the same time you sent this, anyway - apologies for this.

With respect to the attachment sent as an email (August 5th) I would be grateful if you could provide this as a pdf format if possible. Thank you.

In respect of EIR 202500474203, (in which you have corrected the number) thank you for all the documents provided - this is a great help. However, there was an expectation by now that the Todrig grant application would have a draft contract, or failing that, a provisional estimate for the cost to the taxpayer of the scheme. I would be grateful if the potential cost to the taxpayer for the Todrig scheme could be provided (as for the £527,000 figure for Colmslie).

Response to your review request

In relation to the draft documents released

Further to my review acknowledgement letter dated 8 August 2025, I have now completed my review of our response to your request under the Environmental Information (Scotland) Act and have concluded that the original decision should be upheld without any modifications.

I conducted a thorough review of our initial decision. I carefully examined all the draft contract documents sent to you within the scope of your original EIR request by Gillian Rae in separate emails on 30 July 2025. I compiled a list of the documents released for the purpose of the internal review, providing a detailed explanation for the parts where personal data was redacted, applying an exception under Regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information of a third party).

In relation to the information withheld

As you will see from the schedule attached in Annex B, an exception under 10 (5) (g) of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (the EIRs) applies to some of the documents. This exception allows a Scottish public authority to withhold environmental information if its disclosure would or would likely cause harm.

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance, we are unable to provide some of the information you have requested because of an exception under Regulation 10(4)(d) of the EIRs (material in the course of completion, unfinished documents, and incomplete data). This exception is subject to the public interest test. As you will observe from the draft documents provided to you and the chronological schedule of documents I recreated in column three of Annex B, the Conservancy officers and National Office executive officers have identified and disclosed the infrrmation that is actively being worked on and subject to modifications. I have also carefully considered the information you requested in your review request - ‘a provisional estimate for the cost to the taxpayer of the scheme’ – and concluded that it is not a separate and independent piece of work in its own right. It was determined that this estimate and the final cost depend on the terms of the contract signed by both parties. Therefore, there is no such contract in place, and the scheme is subject to judicial review. As such, no costs to the taxpayer can be estimated or calculated at this time.

This exception is subject to the ‘public interest test’, and we have a statutory obligation to apply it. Therefore, considering all the circumstances of this case and any adverse effects of disclosing incomplete data or data still being collected, we have assessed whether the public interest in
releasing the information outweighs the public interest in maintaining the exception. We have concluded that, overall, the public interest favours upholding the exception. While we recognise there may be a public interest in releasing all the information, the incomplete and partial internal data, along with ongoing data collection, could cause confusion or even mislead.

The schedule of the draft documents released to you in the scope of the original response, with the reference no. 202500474203, is now enclosed as Annex B of this response letter, and exceptions applied are listed in Annex A.

I am sorry that I cannot be more helpful on this occasion. You might be interested in the Forestry Grant Scheme for Woodland Creation, which provides information on the amounts of woodland grant funding available for the various options and items Scottish Forestry would contribute to, available at: https://www.ruralpayments.org/topics/all-schemes/forestry-grant-scheme/woodland-creation/

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 202500479650 - Information released - Annex A

File type

PDF

File size

127.2 kB

EIR 202500479650 - Information released - Annex B

File type

PDF

File size

265.5 kB