Frequently asked questions

Yes. Scotland has introduced its own Freedom of Information legislation to cover all bodies within the remit of the Scottish Parliament for all public authorities registered in Scotland. However, as HSE’s Scottish offices are registered in England they are covered by the England, Wales and Northern Ireland Act.

Yes, you can ask for any information that we hold regardless of its age.  However HSE is not required to hold all it’s information indefinitely so if the information is older than the length of time HSE is required to hold it for (also known as a retention period) then we may no longer hold it.  For more information please download the Business Classification Scheme and Retention Schedule [726KB]

A reply should be sent to you within 20 working days. If your request is complicated in any way we may need longer than 20 working days. If this is the case we will let you know within the original 20 day period and will keep you informed of the progress of your request.

Yes, we can refuse to provide information in certain circumstances which are referred to as exemptions.

Most exemptions have to be considered in two stages:

1. Firstly whether the exemption applies to all or part of the information requested and, if so,
2. Is there a public interest in releasing the information which is greater than withholding it?

For more information on exemptions please visit the Exemptions page on the Information Commissioners website.

A letter will be sent to you explaining why the information is not being sent to you. This letter will explain any exemptions we believe apply to the information you have asked for. We will also explain why this exemption applies.

Exemptions are grounds for refusing to provide information. The FOI Act contains a number of exemptions, for example information which might damage international relations. We will not withhold information unless an exemption applies. For more information on exemptions, please refer to the Ministry of Justice website.

If you are still not satisfied after we have looked at your request again, you can then ask the Information Commissioner to look into the way your request has been handled. The Commissioner is an independent officer who is appointed by the Queen and who reports directly to Parliament. In most cases the Commissioner can see all the papers about your request and decide whether our decision is fair and meets the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act.

The Commissioner can be contacted at:

Information Commissioners Office

Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF

Fax: 01625 524 510

Website: http://www.informationcommissioner.gov.uk

It is important to remember that Freedom of Information does not extend to the provision of personal information about yourself. Such requests will be handled under the Data Protection Act 1998 [ [444KB]

The only person explicitly given the right to information under the Data Protection Act is the person to whom the information relates. It is extremely unlikely that any information about you would be given to anyone other than you or your representatives. All requests for personal information will be dealt with under the Data Protection Act not the Freedom of Information Act.

HSE is committed to openness and aim to release as much information as possible both routinely and in response to requests under Freedom of Information (FOI) legislation. We will aim to provide information free of charge wherever we can. However, it is possible that we may need to charge for requests and in some cases refuse them, if providing the information would involve a substantial diversion of resources. In such circumstances we will always provide advice and assistance to help applicants narrow down or clarify their request before charging or refusing the request.

There are two types of chargeable fees:

• Prescribed costs of the request – the cost of finding, sorting, editing or redacting the material when it exceeds £600, as defined in the Fees regulations.
• Disbursements, such as printing, photocopying, postage or information provide in other formats, to be charged in all cases where costs exceed £35.

Information will be supplied free of charge for requests costing less than £600, or for disbursements costing less than £35. For further information please refer to our Charging Policy.

Yes except in exceptional circumstances.

When an organisation receives two or more requests relating to the same or similar information within a period of 60 working days from either the same person or different people who appear to be acting together or in pursuance of a campaign they can be linked together for charging purposes. We call this ‘aggregating’ the requests. For more information please refer to our Charging Policy.