Minutes of the working group for Varroa control in Scotland meetings: EIR release

Information requested

Provide the minutes of all [the working group for Varroa control in Scotland] meetings.

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

I enclose a copy of the information you requested.

The Scottish Government is in the process of re-instating its Varroa Working Group. Due to resource constraints within the bee health team, the Varroa Working Group was not officially progressed beyond its two initial meetings. The issue of Varroa controls in Scotland, however, remained a key priority for the Bee Health Improvement Partnership (BHIP). It also forms the first issue of the Honey Bee Health Strategy 2022-2032's new Implementation Plan. Further details on the Honey Bee Health Strategy 2022-2032's Implementation Plan can be found here: Scotland’s Honey Bee Health Strategy: implementation plan - gov.scot (www.gov.scot).

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.

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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.

Varroa Scottish Working Group Minutes

File type

5 page PDF

File size

281.3 kB