Building a New Scotland - Papers on series of independence: FOI release

Information requested

Now that the Building a New Scotland series of independence papers has concluded, please list all those papers for which a draft was completed, but the paper was not actually published.

For each of these draft unpublished papers, please provide the latest draft version held by the Scottish Government.

Response

There was one unpublished paper in the Building A New Scotland series which had a completed draft. This unpublished paper related to health in an independent Scotland and was titled Health and social care in an independent Scotland.

Regarding your request to be provided with the latest draft of the health paper, an exemption under S30C has been applied. An explanation as to why this has been applied is included in Annex A of this document.

Annex A

Section 30 C - Otherwise prejudice effective conduct of public affairs

The reason why this exemption applies is because releasing draft documents, which have not gone through the full clearance process, would undermine the Scottish Government’s ability to effectively and accurately engage and communicate with the public. This would constitute substantial prejudice to the effective conduct of public affairs in terms of the exemption.

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. 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, there is a greater public interest in enabling the Scottish Government to effectively and accurately engage and communicate with the public without the risk of being prejudiced by inaccurate information regarding draft materials, which do not reflect final decisions taken.

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.