London Borough Of Barking and Dagenham Council

The complainant submitted a request to the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham (the Council) seeking information about the “Homes for Ukraine” initiative including a copy of any audit reports of the program. The Council disclosed some information in relation to the request but withheld a copy of the audit report on the basis of sections 36(2)(b)(i) and 36(2)(c) (effective conduct of public affairs) of FOIA. The Commissioner’s decision is that the audit report is exempt on the basis of the exemptions cited. However the public interest only favours maintaining these exemptions for some parts of the report; for the remaining parts of the report the public interest favours disclosure of the information. The Council also breached section 17 of FOIA by failing to issue a valid refusal notice within 20 working days of the request.