Aberdeen City Council (Drinking in Public Places) Byelaws 2009 correspondence: FOI release

Information requested

Part 1

There was a statutory requirement (Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973, s.202A)) for these byelaws to be reviewed not later than 10 years from them coming into force, i.e. by 1st October 2019.

Please provide all correspondence relating to the review of the byelaws between the Scottish Government (SG) and each of:

1. Aberdeen City Council (ACC);
2. The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS); and
3. Police Scotland.

Of particular interest is any correspondence referencing, or relating to, SG Circular No.LJ/02/2014 ("Byelaws prohibiting consumption of alcohol in designated public places circular: August 2014") [https://www.gov.scot/publications/byelaws-prohibiting-consumption-of-alcohol-in-designated-publicplaces-august-2014-circular/] and how it came to be that sections 5 and 6 of this advice were disregarded by ACC when reviewing the byelaws, despite the advice being "new information" between the introduction of the byelaws in 2009 and their review in 2019.

Part 2

Please provide all internal correspondence within SG which refers to, or relates to:

1. These specific ACC byelaws;
2. Byelaws prohibiting the consumption of alcohol in general (or byelaws specific to other local authority areas), particularly regarding their compatibility with the advice and policies in the SG Circular; and
3. SG's policy position on byelaws which prohibit, or seek to prohibit, the consumption of alcohol in public places, particularly across entire local authority areas.

The period for which correspondence is requested for both Parts 1 and 2 is from 1st January 2019 until the date of your response to this request.

Response

I enclose a copy of some of the information that you have requested. The Scottish Government does not have some of the information you have requested. The reasons for this are set out below.

Furthermore, an exemption under section 38(1)(b) of FOISA applies to some of the information that you have requested. This exemption applies to protect the personal data of a third party, i.e. names and contact details, 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. The Scottish Government has a policy of not disclosing the names of officials who are not Senior Civil Servants.

This exemption 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 exemption.

Part 1

The response to your request for 1, 2 and 3 is that the Scottish Government does not have any correspondence between itself and Aberdeen City Council, The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and Police Scotland regarding the 10 year review of the Aberdeen City Council’s alcohol byelaws.

It may be helpful to explain that it is not a requirement for a local authority to inform the Scottish Government that they have reviewed their alcohol byelaws in line with Section 202A of the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973 or to provide information about any such review.

If, after the review, there are proposed amendments to the alcohol byelaws then the local authority should follow the procedure for amending alcohol byelaws.

Part 2

1. There is no internal Scottish Government correspondence from 1 January 2019 to the date of your request relating to Aberdeen City Council's alcohol byelaws.

2. Attached is a document (Doc 1) which contains discussion of a media query regarding East Lothian Council's proposals to amend their byelaw coverage area to include the whole of the East Lothian Council area.

This document has been redacted under section 38(1)(b) - Personal Data relating to a Third Party - Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002.

3. Attached is a document (Doc 2) which is related to Glasgow City Council's alcohol byelaws and contains information about the Scottish Government's position on alcohol byelaws.

This document has been redacted under section 38(1)(b) - Personal Data relating to a Third Party - Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002.

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FOI 202500499558 - Information released - Documents

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