Transport Scotland A96 dualling documentation: EIR release
Information request and response under the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004.
Information requested
All documentation held by the Scottish Government, including correspondence sent and received (including internal), minutes/notes from meetings, briefings, analysis, about dualling the A96, from the last month.
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.
Please refer to Annex A which contains correspondence sent to or from Scottish Ministers in relation to the A96 Dualling from the 16 September 2025 to the 16 October 2025.
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. This exception has been applied to Annex A and C.
Please refer to Annex B which contains extracts of briefings and submissions sent to or from Scottish Ministers in relation to the A96 Dualling from the 16 September 2025 to the 16 October 2025.
Some information was also expected under 10(4)(e) of the EIRs (internal communications) applies to the information requested because it is internal communication between Transport Scotland / Scottish Government officials and Scottish Ministers. The reasons why that exception applies are explained below.
This exception is subject to the ‘public interest test’. This means we have taken account of all the circumstances of the case and considered whether, on balance, disclosing the information is outweighed by the public good to be had by applying the exception. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of applying the exception and I have outlined the (specific) reasons for this below.
We do recognise that there is some public interest in releasing this information as part of open, transparent and accountable government, and to inform public debate. However, this is outweighed by the ability for Scottish Government, its Ministers and officials to be able to discuss, debate and deliver high quality policy including the decision-making processes in a private thinking space and ensuring it can be conducted in an environment which does not hamper this process. In order to do so they must be able to properly discuss, debate and exchange views on how implementing policy will be undertaken and part of this is the development of briefing material, the deliberations that have taken place and the decisions made until policy is finalised. Ministers and officials need to be able to consider all available options and to debate those rigorously, to fully understand their possible implications and therefore it would not be appropriate to release information ahead of that process concluding.
Please refer to Annex C which contains minutes from meetings with Scottish Ministers in relation to the A96 Dualling from the 16 September 2025 to the 16 October 2025.
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.
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