Just to confirm that Labour's relationship with democracy is (shall we say) uneven:
the Govt. is once again (like previous Govt.s) considering constraining & narrowing the scope of Freedom of Information requests, citing cost as the reason, when its more likely linked to such transparency often presented in the Westminster Village as representing a friction that makes governing more difficult.
Of course, they could just be more open & transparent?
#FreedomOfInformation #politics
h/t FT
Having worked in climate-adjacent research for a while, I'm aware that there absolutely are such things as vexatious and frivolous FoI requests, and that they are a real problem, but I don't suppose those are the ones the government will attempt to limit.
(Also, quite a lot of FoI requests are submitted by employees inside the responder organisations, trying to get the management information they need to do their jobs properly, which indicates a whole other problem.)
The second type of issue is extraordinary - I was sort of vaguely aware of this, but I wonder what the extent as a proportion of all it is... any idea?
Emeritus Prof Christopher May
Dan Hatton