Norwegian Mountain Salmon (NMS) correspondence: EIR release

Information requested

Disclosure of all recorded information held by the Scottish Government relating to communications with Norwegian Mountain Salmon (NMS) during the period 1 January 2025 to 22 December 2025.

For the avoidance of doubt, this request includes, but is not limited to:

• Emails (including internal and external emails)
• Letters
• Briefing notes
• Meeting minutes and notes
• Agendas
• Presentations
• Instant messages or messaging app communications (including, where held, WhatsApp, Signal, Microsoft Teams or similar platforms)
• Diary entries and calendar invitations
• Records of telephone or video calls, including notes or summaries

This request covers communications involving Scottish Government Ministers, special advisers, civil servants, agencies, or officials acting on behalf of the Scottish Government.

In particular, I request all records relating to the meeting held between representatives of Norwegian Mountain Salmon and the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Land Reform and Islands, Mairi Gougeon, in Norway in August 2025, including but not limited to:

• Correspondence arranging the meeting
• Attendee lists
• Notes or minutes taken during or after the meeting
• Any follow-up correspondence or actions arising from the meeting

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 most of the information you requested.

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 exceptions under regulation 11(2) (personal data of a third party), regulation 10(4)(d) (material in the course of completion, unfinished documents or incomplete data) and regulation 10(5)(e) (confidentiality of commercial or industrial information) of the EIRs apply to that information. The reasons why these exceptions apply are explained in the Annex to this letter.

ANNEX

REASONS FOR NOT PROVIDING INFORMATION

Exceptions apply.

Regulation 11(2) personal data of a third party

An exception under regulation 11(2) (personal data of a third party) of the EIRs applies to some of the information you have requested.

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance 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.

Regulation 10(4)(d) – material in the course of completion, unfinished documents or incomplete data

An exception under regulation 10(4)(d) (unfinished or incomplete information) of the EIRs applies to some of the information you have requested and one of the internal, draft (incomplete) documents within the scope of your request have been withheld in full. The reason for this is, that at the time of your request, the final version of this document was completed. Therefore, we have instead released a copy of that.

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 some public interest in release as part of open, transparent and accountable government, and this has been met by release of the final version of the document to you. For the draft versions, the public interest in releasing is outweighed by the public interest in ensuring that  incomplete information is not disclosed when it might misinform the public or give a misleading impression of the Government’s view or position on the matter to which the information relates and which was incomplete.

Regulation 10(5)(e) – (confidentiality of commercial or industrial information)

An exception under regulation 10(5)(e) of the EIRs (substantial prejudice to confidentiality of commercial information) applies to some of the information you have requested. This exception applies because disclosure of this particular information would, or would be likely to, prejudice substantially the confidentiality of commercial information provided by Norwegian Mountain Salmon thus cause substantial harm to their commercial interests.

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 some public interest in disclosing information as part of open and transparent government. However, this is outweighed by the public interest in ensuring that the economic interests of companies are not impacted, particularly where information is commercial or economic in nature and which are not in the public domain.

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 202500499541 - Information Released - Documents

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