The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has published a new checklist to help people find information that is already publicly available.
The tool, which can be found on the ‘for the public’ section of the ICO website, provides helpful tips as to where people can find resources which may provide the information they’re looking for.
Deborah Clark, ICO Upstream Regulation Manager, said: “My team has carried out research with Freedom of Information (FOI) practitioners across the country to understand their concerns and challenges when it comes to adhering to the FOI Act. One of the themes that came out is that their caseload often consists of requests for information that is already available.
“This checklist should help save the public time finding the information they want by signposting them to resources they may not have been aware of.”
The checklist can be found in the green box titled: ‘Searching for information’ on the ‘How to access information from a public authority’ page of the ICO’s website.
There is more detail on the ICO’s work to support public authorities to be open and transparent in Deborah’s recent blog post.