Introduction and Background

The Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FoIA) which received Royal assent in November 2000 and comes fully into force January 2005 requires various public bodies, of which the County Council is one, to publish a Publication Scheme ('the Scheme') to assist public access to information held by those bodies. The Staffordshire County Council scheme is designed to indicate the nature and extent of information held by the Council which it routinely publishes or intends to routinely publish. The rights conferred by the FoIA are retrospective applying to information held by the Council prior to this scheme and in addition to rights of access afforded under other legislation.

Information Availability

Information may be held in many forms, and as mentioned below, this scheme indicates what the format(s) may be in respect of particular information. Some information may be accessed electronically via Staffordshire County Council web site from February 2003. The public right of access to information which is not available electronically (and for which a fee may be charged) is not required by the FoIA to apply until January 2005. However, in the interim the Council will endeavour to deal with requests in the spirit of openness in local government.

Information which may be exempt from Publication
Although the Scheme refers to a wide range of information held by the Council irrespective of format (i.e. electronic video, audio paper copy), not all information may be accessed by the public. Access may be prohibited because, for example, the information relates to an individual and is therefore protected by the Data Protection Act 1998; or is subject to other categories of information which are treated as Exempt under FoIA. Where information within the scheme falls within an exempted category there will be a short comment advising you. Click here for a more detailed reference explaining Exempt Information

Updating the Scheme

The Scheme will be reviewed periodically and adapted as necessary, which may result in additional classes of information being added to or deleted from, the Scheme in accordance with the Council's retention policy and as approved by the Office for the Information Commissioner.

Charges

The Council will endeavour to make as much information available electronically as it can. Access to the Council website and the information contained within the website scheme will be free of charge but we may charge you for

Information printed from the website at a Council Public access terminal
Publications - in accordance with the current cover price
Requests for information which is not published within the scheme - charges will be in accordance with regulations and details will be sent to you before your request may be processed.

Searching for Information

As an aid to searching for information, the Publication Scheme uses category and sub-category headings, each sub-category contains more specific information. To find information you can: -

Enter a word in the search box where it says Enter Search Text:, this will find all documents with the word in the title, or in the keywords associated with the publication.
Browse through the publications by selecting a category of information, then a sub-category, you will then have a choice of information which when selected will give you a list of publications

Last Modified: 22/11/2005 15:23:43
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