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Friday, March 27, 2015

Some of Prince Charles letters under FOI scrutiny-at last

The Prince Charles letters Freedom of Information saga now in its 10th year is back in the news in the UK and here with the Supreme Court decision that some now ancient letters to ministers in so far as they contain 'advocacy correspondence' should be released, 


It's about powers to issue a conclusive ministerial certificate so not all that relevant in FOI jurisprudence here as certificates were abolished by Labor in 2009.

As to the battle by The Guardian, deep breath, here's my short summary:
The Supreme Court upheld the Court of Appeal decision to quash a certificate issued by the Attorney-General that vetoed an Upper Tribunal finding that reversed the decision of the Information Commissioner who had upheld the departments' decisions to refuse to disclose the letters. 

Truly. 

(Update - Kevin Dunion in a comment says my summary left one decision out-I defer to him.)

2 comments:

  1. Hi Peter , I think there is a further intermediate step - in that the case went to the Court of Appeal "ON APPEAL FROM THE DIVISIONAL COURT, ADMINISTRATIVE COURT, QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION" and overturned that Divisional Court's decision which had upheld the use of the veto.

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  2. Thanks Kevin-quite a saga.

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