Minutes of meetings held within the last 6 months on the Deposit Return Scheme concerns: EIR release

Information requested

1. Minutes of meetings held within the last 6 months between Minister Lorna Slater and industry on the Deposit Return Scheme where concerns were raised about the scheme.
2. In respect of Minister Lorna Slater's portfolio, please provide details of the project board within Scottish Government responsible for the Deposit Return Scheme, please provide

• Membership of the board(s)
• Frequency of meetings, dates, agendas and attendance records
• Minutes of the meetings held in the past 12 months
• A copy of the risk register presented at each of the board meetings
• Impact analysis of the decision to delay the Deposit Return Scheme, and the changes to the scheme announced in Holyrood on the 20th April 2023

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.

Response

Question 1

I have included copies of the information you have requested in Annex B.

On reviewing materials within the scope of your request, exceptions have been applied in line with the EIRs. The exceptions applied can be found in Annex A.

Question 2

I have included copies of the information you have requested in Annex C.

On reviewing materials within the scope of your request, exceptions have been applied in line with the EIRs. The exceptions applied can be found in Annex A.

The Scottish Government has established an Executive Oversight Group (EOG) with Zero Waste Scotland, Circularity Scotland and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency which acts as the project board for the Deposit Return Scheme.

In regards to your request for copies of the risk registers used for the EOG meetings and impact analysis conducted into the recent decision to delay the launch of the Deposit Return Scheme (DRS), 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 regulations 10(4)(d) (material in the course of completion) and 10(4)(e) (internal communications) of the EIRs applies to that information. The reasons why these exceptions apply are explained in Annex A of this letter.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

Annex A - 202300352748

File type

1 page PDF

File size

66.9 kB

Annex B - 202300352748

File type

44 page PDF

File size

402.7 kB

Annex C - 202300352748

File type

6 page PDF

File size

146.4 kB