Copyright in sets of meeting minutes

Once Mr Mustard found out about the warning circular sent by London Councils, some questions came to his mind. Here they are along with the answers.

3. Similarly to the anonymous employee who was over-using his/her initiative Mr Mustard thinks that the circular that was sent breached his expectation that the circular would not have been sent and his name effectively disclosed.

4. No point in having in-house FOI experts if you don't ask them the necessary questions at the material time.

5. There was no need to do anything other than respond to the enquiries actually made.

6. So the circular that was sent should never have been sent as providing advice on FOI is not part of the remit of London Councils. All London boroughs have their own experts or access to them.

7. In short, Yes.

8. Very odd that different boroughs sent Mr Mustard minutes with different dates, none of which were correct.

9. London Councils were blind.

11. Oh no, no copyright in the minutes and yet the following bodies told Mr Mustard there was so he could not have them. 

Ealing Council, Enfield Council, Harrow Council, Hounslow Council, Lambeth Council, Lewisham Council, Newham Council, Sutton Council, Waltham Forest Council & Wandsworth Council.

What a shocking lack of knowledge of FOI and Copyright.

13. There was discussion of the subject of minutes and copyright though. The next set of minutes will be interesting. Want to bet that they are even briefer now?

Parking departments can run from Mr Mustard but they can't hide.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

London Councils - not applicant blind

When Mr Mustard was struggling to obtain the full set of documents from London Councils and the names of the parking managers or substitutes who attended, he decided to go straight to the councils concerned as they would, if the employees were senior, have to tell him their names. He did this on 13 September.

On the very same day London Councils had heard from some boroughs of Mr Mustard's* request for the minutes etc. and they decided to email other councils in London to warn them of the likely request. Bo so doing, they effectively outed Mr Mustard as having already asked London Councils the same question. The whole point of FOI is that it is applicant blind. It isn't when bodies take it upon themselves to send circulars like the one above.

What London Councils didn't point out was that they told Mr Mustard there weren't any documents (in addition to the agenda and minutes) appertaining to the meeting. That was odd, and wrong, as the minutes themselves referred to two documents about PCN codes and utility suspension charges.

The councils around London weren't holding the document on behalf of London Councils but in their own capacity as parking authorities for their own areas.

Mr Mustard though that the 'if they are still held' comment was an unspoken suggestion to chuck away any minutes that individual officers had taken so that they did not have to be disclosed. Certainly many council did not have any notes to disclose.

You can rely on Mr Mustard to battle to the end. The denouement is coming soon.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

*Whether or not any indivdual council who consulted London Councils released Mr Mustard's name is not a question he asked.

A 41,000 to one chance

Birmingham is famous for Baltis. This meal from Adil's.

There are about 41,000 employees at Birmingham City Council.

Mr Mustard's alter ego made a FOI request to Birmingham C.C. on 10 August and on which they have faffed about, asking for clarification of a simple request for a copy contract, then releasing just a pre-contractual document, a specification, then sending some annexes which had the name of the applicant added into the documents as a footer (a sneaky move in case they were passed on, they could be traced back) and then sending what was meant to be the rest of the Contract but it wasn't and none of the documents were the signed ones so could have changed before the actual signatures were added. A painful process which has seen emails back and forth over 5 separate days including today.

FOI requests are meant to be answered under the rules that they are motive and applicant blind (i.e. bloggers get the same factual answer as everybody else). The Information Tribunal has stated:

"FOIA is, however, applicant and motive blind. It is about disclosure to the public, and public interests. It is not about specified individuals or private interests."

Mr Mustard keeps an eye on who visits his blog, and the Famous Five blog, and what search terms are used. When anyone at Birmingham City Council lands on a blog he knows. The search came from the computer with address 80.249.57.49 which is Birmingham City Council - Service Birmingham Ltd a JV between Capita and the council to provide their computers. The search term was the name of Mr Mustard's alter ego and the search came from a computer using Internet Explorer 8, Windows 7 and with a screen resolution of 1440 by 900.

Unless there happens to be another employee at Birmingham City Council who just happened to search for another person of the same name and landed on the blog by accident, although the name is thought to be unique in the UK, then the FOI officer has googled him. It has taken 3 people at the council so far to fail to answer a simple question for a copy contract (one that Barnet Council managed to answer in a mere 5 months except that part of the answer has gone missing and there are some redactions which Mr Mustard has to think about) and Mr Mustard has challenged the two most recent respondents and one has said that it was not her. She is far too busy to carry out research (well done - correct answer, and also irrelevant to her job).

Let us see what the other one says.

Mr Mustard doesn't mind FOI officers looking up his details but only after they have answered his questions on an applicant blind basis and he suggests they do it at home so they don't show up in the search trail.

Barnet Council have described Mr Mustard looking up staff using google as akin to cyber-stalking. Mr Mustard has instructed Birmingham City Council that they may not communicate with Barnet Council but should you get a request Barnet Council you will have to tell Birmingham CC that you can't answer any questions that emanate from their "cyber-stalking".

What might the Information Commissioner have to say about this? 

Birmingham City Council would be well advised to now work their socks off to provide the entire Contract with exempted items redacted before a complaint gets made.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard