Horsenden Primary School

The complainant has requested Board minutes from Horsenden Primary School (‘the School’). Their interest is an Employment Tribunal case. The School disclosed some information and withheld other information, including about the Tribunal, under sections 36(2) and 40(2) of FOIA. These exemptions concern prejudice to the effective conduct of public affairs and personal data, respectively. The Commissioner finds that: On the balance of probabilities, other than the information the School has disclosed and the information about the Tribunal that it’s withholding, the School holds no further information about that Tribunal in the requested Board minutes. Section 40(2) of FOIA is engaged in respect of all the information in the 5 July 2023 minute that the School’s withholding. However, section 40(2) isn’t engaged in respect of the 20 March 2024 minute: some of that information isn’t personal data and, while the remainder is personal data, the Commissioner finds it would be lawful to disclose it. 
Section 36(2)(c) is engaged in respect of the small amount of information in the 20 March 2024 minute to which the School has applied this exemption. The School’s handling of the request didn’t comply with sections 1(1) 9(3), 10(1) or 17(1) of FOIA. The School must take the following steps to ensure compliance with the legislation: Disclose the information in the 20 March 2024 minute to which the School has applied section 40(2) of FOIA only. If it hasn’t already done so, issue an appropriate refund to the complainant for the fee that it charged them to provide information within scope of their request. As a minimum, the School must refund the element of the fee that was for staff time i.e. £40.90p.