ICO issues enforcement notice to GMP over failure to clear FoI backlog

The ICO said it was not “seeing the improvement both we and the public need” and the force could be found in contempt of court if it fails to comply with the notice.

GMP currently has a backlog of 850 overdue requests. Of these, more than 800 are over six months old and 580 are over a year old, said the ICO. The oldest open request was submitted almost two and a half years prior to the issuing of this enforcement notice.

The enforcement notice issued on Wednesday (December 20) follows the practice recommendation issued in February 2023 after the ICO’s routine monitoring showed that GMP was the most complained-about police force for timeliness over the previous 12 months.

“GMP wanted to clear the backlog by the end of 2024, but this was deemed unacceptable,” the ICO said.

Phillip Angell, head of FoI casework at the ICO, said: “In issuing this enforcement notice today, we are demanding urgent action from GMP in responding to FoI requests.

“GMP has currently done little to address the response backlog.

“Whilst we recognise that an action plan has been put in place and some progress has been made to improve its timeliness since the issuing of the practice recommendation, we are not seeing the improvement both we and the public need to see at the pace we need to see it.

“Improved response times to incoming requests should not be made at the expense of clearing the existing backlog – they should go hand in hand.

“There is nothing more important than the police maintaining the trust and understanding of the public, but this is not the way to earn that trust. Transparency is key, and compliance with freedom of information requests is a vital part of that.”

The ICO said GMP must now devise and publish an action plan within 35 days detailing how it will respond to information requests in a timely fashion, while also clearing its backlog of late requests by July 31, 2024. The force could be held in contempt of court if it fails to comply with these actions.

Ian Cosh, Senior Informaton Risk Owner at GMP, said the force takes the enforcement notice issued by the ICO “incredibly seriously” and has an action plan in place, which is already in motion, enabling the force to respond timely to incoming requests, while managing an unprecedented volume of requests in recent years.

He said: “GMP are committed to transparency and upholding individuals’ access rights, and since receiving the Practice Recommendation from the ICO in February, GMP has engaged in positive discussions with the ICO. We have introduced a robust action plan which includes new practices and processes to better service the public’s right to request information, which has already delivered positive results.

“This action plan includes reprioritising existing force resources into the team, as well as recruiting new staff, some of whom have already started with us.

“GMP has focused on delivering long-term and sustainable improvement in our information access service. As a result, our compliance rate has improved significantly, exceeding 80 per cent consistently over the last four months and the national average for police forces which currently stands at 76 per cent.

“I do not take these steps in the right direction as complacency, but I want to provide the public reassurance that I’m confident that our action plan will result in us managing outstanding requests in a timely manner and maintaining compliancy with statutory requirements.”