Inside FOI Journalism

The Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOI) is an essential tool for the journalist seeking to hold public institutions to account. But for those handling FOI requests from journalists, the challenge is to balance minimising the resource burden on the organisation with maintaining openness and transparency. This requires a good understanding of the journalist’s motivation, tactics and pressures.

In this episode we are joined by Martin Rosenbaum. Martin spent 16 years at the BBC as the organisation’s leading specialist in using FOI for journalism. He is the author of Freedom of Information: A Practical Guidebook - a comprehensive, hands-on guide that explains the law, the process, and the tactics for using FOI effectively.

We talk about:

• How journalists use FOI to uncover the truth and inform the public
• The tactics that make the difference between a successful request and a dead end
• How FOI has evolved since its introduction 
• And what information professionals can learn from the media’s use of this powerful tool

If you like this podcast, please listen to Episode 3 where Maurice Frenkel of the Campaign for Freedom of Information (CFOI) reflects on 20 years of the Freedom of Information Act.

Useful Links

Phaselaw

Martin’s Blog

Freedom of Information: A Practical Guidebook 

Act Now FOI Blogs

This podcast is sponsored by Phaselaw - a purpose-built solution for document disclosures, like subject access requests and FOI requests. Instead of redacting PDFs one by one, or forcing litigation software to do a job it wasn't designed for, with Phaselaw you get collection, review, and redaction in one workflow. Teams across the World are using it to cut response times from weeks to days.

For Guardians of Data listeners, Phaselaw is offering a two-month free trial; run it on live requests, see what it does to your backlog, decide from there. No card, no commitment.

Transcript

Ibrahim Hasan 0:06

Welcome to Guardians of Data, the show where we explore the world of information law and information governance. From privacy in AI to cybersecurity and freedom of information. I'm Ibrahim Hassan. In each episode, we speak with experts and practitioners to unpack the big issues shaping the IG profession. Freedom of information, or FOI, has transformed how journalists, researchers, and citizens hold institutions to account. Recent FOI requests by journalists have revealed details about government pandemic contracts, how waiting times at hospitals differ by ethnicity and deprivation levels in certain areas, and police force data about officer misconduct allegations and discrimination complaints. For those handling FYI requests from journalists, the challenge is to balance minimizing the resource burden on the organization with maintaining openness and transparency. This requires a good understanding of the journalists' motivation, tactics, and pressures. Today I'm joined by someone who quite literally wrote the book on FOI, Martin Rosenbaum. Martin spent 16 years at the BBC as the organization's leading specialist in using FOI for journalism. Over that time, he broke major stories, trained reporters, and took cases all the way to tribunal hearings. His investigations have covered everything from private conversations between Tony Blair and Bill Clinton to the policing of Greenham Common protests to the flaws in the honors system. Martin is also the author of Freedom of Information, a practical guidebook, a comprehensive, hands-on guide that explains the law, the process, and the tactics for using FOI effectively. In this episode, we'll talk about how journalists use FOI to uncover the truth and inform the public, the tactics that make the difference between a successful request and a dead end, how FOI has evolved since its introduction, and where it might go next, and what information professionals can learn from the media's use of this powerful tool. Whether you work in information governance, public service, or the media, or you simply believe in transparency and accountability, this conversation will give you practical insights into how FOI really works and why it still matters today. Let's get started. Welcome to the show, Martin. Thanks very much for having me on. It's great to be here. Fantastic. I remember, Martin, when we first met. We met over in in on the FOI circuit for the last 20 years, but I remember you were one of my first guests on the original Freedom of Information podcast back, was it about 20 years ago? Yeah, that's right. And uh you were certainly one of the podcast pioneers were doing it before it became fashionable. I know if I did it, it just carried on. But uh, to be honest, at the time it was such a laborious process because if you remember, I was interviewing you over the phone and then having to edit it and then upload it and everything else, and now it's just done at the click of a button. But yes, a parallel life out there, I would be the equivalent of uh Stephen Bartlett in the FOI world. But here we are.

Martin Rosenbaum 3:28

It could have happened, it could have happened.

Ibrahim Hasan 3:30

So you spent many years using the Freedom of Information Act to produce quite impactful journalism, and I'm sure you're going to um regale us with some of the stories and discoveries that you've made using FOI later on. But I just want to go back to the beginning before FOI. What was journalism like? What was it like to try and elicit information from public sector institutions, especially government?

Martin Rosenbaum 3:56

Well, the key thing about FOI is that it gives you a legal right under certain circumstances to squeeze information out of people who might be reluctant to give it to you. That's really from the journalistic point of view. Now, obviously, prior to FOI coming in, journalism did lots and lots of stories, lots of stories about government. In some ways, it wasn't very different, but there were certain particular stories that you couldn't get because you didn't have that legal right to get information out of public authorities. And that's the key change that is brought about. I wouldn't claim that it transforms the majority of journalism, because you know, for a lot of journalists, they actually use it very little if at all. And that's a lot to do with the delay that is involved in using FOI. It's not something for daily stories, it's only for longer-term stories. But for those longer-term, more in-depth, more investigative stories, it's a very valuable resource.

Ibrahim Hasan 4:53

Before the Freedom of Information Act came into force, Martin, there were other instruments or codes of practice which gave access to information held by government. What was it like working with those codes?

Martin Rosenbaum 5:07

Yeah, so I did make use of the access to government information code, the code of practice that existed, as you say, at the time. I think the first thing that has to be said about it is that hardly anybody knew about it. I mean, certainly, you know, not many journalists knew about it, but even when you were saying to government departments or other public authorities, large ones, there's this code of practice, I'm entitled to this information, you find a lot of people didn't know about it. And I did actually write an article for the Press Gazette, this sort of journalism trade magazine about this. This is before I worked for the BBC, where I'd asked lots of public authorities for very simple information under this code of practice on open government. And I can't remember now, this is many years ago, I can't remember the number who didn't reply or said that they didn't knew nothing about it, but it was a very substantial proportion. So that was one reason why the code didn't really make much difference, because neither journalists nor public authorities were really aware of it. But the second thing about it was that if they, you know, if they didn't want to give you the information, they could just ignore the code. There was no legal recourse, you didn't have you couldn't complain to the information commissioner about things, you couldn't go to a tribunal or anything. That was just the end of the matter because it was purely advisory. So I think the the advisory code that existed before the actual Freedom of Information Act came into force really had very, very minimal difference to making government more open.

Ibrahim Hasan 6:37

So now you've got a statutory right to receive information, and of course, anybody can make a request for information. How would you say that FOI has changed the relationship between public authorities, journalists, uh, and the public?

Martin Rosenbaum 6:52

So, as I say, that it's the legal right that counts, and so you can sometimes squeeze information out that otherwise you wouldn't have been able to, and public authorities are aware of that. So the relationship between journalists and public authorities, say when you're dealing with press officers, is made different by that because uh you might be asking a press officer for certain kinds of information, and previously you would know there was a brick wall you weren't going to get beyond, but now the press office knows okay, there's actually a kind of route over the brick wall for certain kinds of information. Obviously, we know there are lots of exemptions, and so sometimes you know, press officers will give you that information anyway because they know you could get it under FOI. Sometimes they want to make you go through the business of doing it under FOI because of the delay. But it does mean that that kind of power relationship between uh journalists and press officers is tilted a bit in the journalists' direction because there they know sometimes there is this information you get. And the same also applies not only to journalists, but also to requesters, which might be campaign groups, they might be businesses, they might be individual members of the community, could be anybody who also now has this legal power which public authorities are aware of, which gives power to them as opposed to the public authority.

Ibrahim Hasan 8:18

So, Martin, over the years you've broken lots of stories using the Freedom of Information Act. Can you share a memorable story that stands out as an example of the power of the Freedom of Information Act?

Martin Rosenbaum 8:31

So there is one story in particular, which amongst many though, but it's one which has stood out in my mind as encapsulating some of the benefits of freedom of information. Although in some ways it's quite a mundane everyday kind of story. But what it is is I obtained, and it took me 18 months to do this, an 18-month dispute with the agency from the Department for Transport. But I eventually managed to obtain information about which makes and models of cars were most likely to fail their MOT tests. And I knew this information must exist because the government was collecting all this information from MOT garages, that garages that did MOTs. I knew it existed. And I thought this information is of use to the public to know which cars have the best records of however old they are, how likely they are to fail MOTs or not. Uh, as I say, this was resisted by Department for Transport Agency, who um said that it was it would breach commercial confidentiality to release the information, it was damaging commercial interests. My view was it's overwhelmingly in the public interest for the public to have this kind of information. The information commissioner ruled in my favor eventually. So the information was actually published and this came out. But the thing that I most like about this story is the fact that this information, which for 18 months the Department for Transport told me was too sensitive reveal, is now actually published annually, proactively every year by them as open data. So this information is now available to anybody on the internet all the time, updated every year as a matter of routine, despite the fact that there was this initial resistance to making it available. And that to me is really a kind of the the sort of symbolic triumph of FOI to take information which at one point was considered too sensitive to reveal, get it out there in the open, now it's revealed routinely as a matter of course. And I think that's a symbolic thing for FOI.

Ibrahim Hasan 10:42

Absolutely. Do you think that over the last 20 years now we've seen a culture change thanks to FOI, where organizations are, particularly government, becoming more open and more routinely publishing information, whereas previously they wouldn't have done so?

Martin Rosenbaum 10:59

I think there's been a mix, really. Things have gone in waves. Initially, when FOI first came into force in 2005 and the couple of years after that, there definitely was certainly among some public authorities a kind of enthusiasm for it. They felt it was part of the mood of the times, the spirit of the times, put information out there. And I think there were responses then, more positive responses to FOI than some of the responses that we would get later. And then I think enthusiasm diminished. They found FOI a bit of a nuisance, sometimes worse, sometimes very embarrassing. Uh, then I think under the Cameron government from 2010, 2015, there was then a kind of big enthusiasm for open data, publishing a lot of stuff proactively, which is not necessarily the same information that people were actually asking for under FOI. It's sometimes it's what the government wants out there than what the public wants to know. Nevertheless, they did push a lot of stuff out there, but also I think there was a kind of effect of galvanizing people a bit into actually we believe in open data. This again is the spirit of the times we should be releasing stuff. And that then has diminished since then. So I think there have been waves, and different public authorities have taken different attitudes at different times. I don't think one can say there's been a total transformation in attitudes to openness and transparency amongst the public sector. That's going too far, but there is certainly partial evidence of that.

Ibrahim Hasan 12:30

It's interesting what you say about the Cameron government that uh they went through a phase of so-called openness and transparency. If you remember the local government transparency code, I think it still requires all payments made by local authorities over £500, and there's thousands of transactions. So sometimes the interesting bits can actually be difficult to find.

Martin Rosenbaum 12:51

That's absolutely true. And I remember when this first started happening, and all these details of invoices and receipts and everything were published, looking through them for certain kinds of public authorities, and it was absolutely overwhelming. And unless you really knew what you were looking for, it was very difficult to find anything of interest.

Ibrahim Hasan 13:11

So you've shared your uh experience of making the request to the Department of Transport, and that was quite significant because it led to a different sort of approach on their part and publishing information now routinely. Any other surprising or personally significant uh discoveries you've made through FOI?

Martin Rosenbaum 13:29

Well, I think there's a couple actually, which are at a different level in a way for that Department for Transport One, because that's like information which is directly of use to the public. But another one which uh I was really thought was important and very struck by was when I eventually obtained, and this again was after quite a fight, a letter which the then Prince Charles, now King, had written to Tony Blair when Blair was prime minister, lobbying him against genetically modified foods, which Charles was very unkeen on and wanted Blair to meet people who would tell him how bad genetically modified foods were. And again, this was a two-year battle with the Cabinet Office to eventually get hold of this, which again eventually needed the information commissioner to rule in my favour. And also, this was actually, as I'm sure some of your listeners would appreciate, it was under the environmental information regulations, which cover environmental information, because GM food comes under that, and they're similar to FOI but not identical. And actually, you couldn't get this under FOI. It was only possible because it was under EIR. But what that illustrated to me was actually with this, these regulations, you could get information which was going right to the heart of the top of government, the kind of innermost sanctum in a way, the communications which were going from the then heir to the throne to the then prime minister. So this was a really powerful reach of FOI to get into that kind of level of sort of inner level within the state and absolutely demonstrated the power of FOI.

Ibrahim Hasan 15:10

But then, of course, Tony Blair was criticized at the time that they termed it sofa government, where his advisors would meet in his flat without records and they were just discussing and making decisions. Uh, perhaps that was a downside of FOI, and and we've seen that with the COVID inquiry as well. The messages were deleted. Do you think that is the case? That freedom of information perhaps has led to, in some quarters, fewer records?

Martin Rosenbaum 15:36

So I think this is a complex topic, and there are different forces that point in different directions. And you're right to refer to Blair's sofa government, as it was called, but that actually was going on before FOI came into force. It was how Blair wanted to do things. And while it might be true that when FOI came in, they did record even less. There were reasons why they were doing that anyway, because they like to operate in that kind of way. It was his personal style. And then taking the COVID inquiry and the the WhatsApp messages, and people, you know, there are WhatsApp messages from certain people, certainly Scotland and Wales, saying we must delete these, and they're often not everybody deleted them, and these are actually ended up being presented at the inquiry. I think what we now have with WhatsApp and other chat apps is that information is now recorded in a certain way, written down, which previously would have been the kind of telephone conversation, the corridor conversation, the informal conversations, that kind of stuff it now ends up being written down. And that is a big challenge in this context because those they tend to be more informal conversations, potentially, you know, potentially more embarrassing, sometimes anyway, not the sort of you know, proper record keeping of state. And it means all this stuff uh is potentially perhaps available, it's certainly become available to the COVID inquiry. Uh, you could put in FOI requests for it, some of it you would get and some of it you wouldn't because of the exemptions. But I think the sort of technological change and the you know the way people now communicate with each other, and of course this may change in the future, but where we're at now has indeed made this whole thing about what is recorded and what is not recorded much more acute and difficult for a lot of people. I agree.

Ibrahim Hasan 17:28

Um, Martin, you've made your craft FOI over the years. Uh, let's just unpack how that works in practice. Now, your book, Freedom of Information, a Practical Guide, gives readers a step-by-step approach in terms of making FOI requests. What would you say are the key tactics or key qualities of a good FOI request separating it from one which could just lead to a dead end?

Martin Rosenbaum 17:53

Well, there are lots of points in a way to bear in mind about how to write effective FOI requests. But I think the core thing above everything else is really to think through very clearly exactly what you're asking for and make sure that the words that you've put down in your email actually ask for it clearly and precisely. In other words, you specify it exactly, and there is no ambiguity in what you have asked for. And you, you know, when I was at the BBC and I was advising other journalists on putting in FOR requests, and they would come to me sometimes and say, Look, I you know, I'm really annoyed. I put in a request for this, I didn't get it. I'll show you the request and the answer. And sometimes I'd end up saying to people, Well, you know, actually, you didn't get what you wanted to get, but you did get what you asked for, because if you look for a literal interpretation of your request, that's what they actually sent you. And the so it's the key thing is just to express it really clearly, specifically, and precisely, and to know what you're trying to get.

Ibrahim Hasan 18:56

And and let's talk about that from the perspective of information governance officers who are dealing with requests from journalists.

Martin Rosenbaum 19:05

What are your tips? So I think uh the FOI professionals, information governance professionals, um they do deal with journalists' requests, obviously. And I think the good ones, best ones accept that this is part of a journalist's job to obtain this information. It might sometimes be embarrassing or annoying or difficult or whatever for their organization, but legally the requirement is there that information has to be made available, and it is the journalist's job in the public interest to get this out, and so it's about following the law and complying with the requests and being reasonable and so on. And I thought so. I think good ones are you know fully aware of that and behave in that kind of way, sometimes meeting resistance from more senior people within their own organizations I know who aren't happy about releasing stuff. And then I think the other thing I think to bear in mind is really is to try and respect journalist deadlines. Uh, for example, if information a request does need clarifying because it hasn't been expressed very well. What's really annoying and frustrating as a journalist is that someone contacts you on the 19th day after you've put the request and says, Hang on a minute, what are you actually asking for here? When it could, you know, it's perfectly obvious they could have done that after one, two or three days, come back to you and said, actually, you've used the wrong phraseology here. It's not asking for, you know, it's not clear what you're really asking for. Please can you clarify? So making sure that things are done with done promptly, that things are done in line with the legal deadlines within the law and so on is also very important.

Ibrahim Hasan 20:48

And and what about communication as a journalist? Would you like somebody to come back to you quickly by email, or would you prefer them to just pick up the phone and talk to you?

Martin Rosenbaum 20:57

100% definitely pick up the phone. And I think that's one thing that has changed is I think it's a bit harder now for those conversations to happen than they used to in the first period of FOI. And I don't know whether that's because people are more reluctant to be helpful. I don't know whether it's because people are under more time pressure, or, you know, as sometimes said actually, a younger generation of people in the office are less keen to talk to people on the phone in general. You know, they prefer to send texts and so on. And there's been a generational shift in the nature of communication messaging, whereas older people are happier talking on the phone. Uh, you know, maybe even that plays a part, but whatever it is, it's much better to have a conversation on the phone where someone, you know, can say you can discuss, you know, not only this request I put in, does it actually make sense? Is it correct? Is the phraseology right? But also, you know, what is likely to be feasible within the time limit, the cost limit, so that and how. How are requests, how are the record systems structured and so on, that so that a particular request makes sense, can actually be processed feasibly? And then you avoid the situation of people putting in a lot of requests which go over the cost limit, or just are you know, end up with people searching record systems which it's futile to search, or the records that are wanted aren't really in those record systems. A lot of that pointless activity, which actually wastes time, both of the information governance professionals, also of the journalists, everybody involved, a lot of that wasted time could be avoided through phone conversations. Uh, and at the end of the phone conversation, you probably would say, okay, what we've agreed is such and such. We put that in writing because an FOI request has to be in writing. We conclude this is what the request is now at the end of the conversation in writing. But it's that phone conversation which facilitates a much more productive relationship, in my view.

Ibrahim Hasan 23:00

And I think uh having those relationships mean that sometimes it may be the case that journalists, rather than uh making a formal FOI request, just pick up the phone and and ask for information. And so that reduces the burden for the FOI officers.

Martin Rosenbaum 23:16

Absolutely, yes. Uh I mean, there's lots of information which can be given out very easily without the need for a formal FOI request and the administrative and bureaucratic processes that they end up going through. And I mean, I would always encourage journalists to have try and have good relationships with FOI officers, and it works both ways from the journalistic point of view. I mean, sometimes, you know, people would suggest to you actually, you know, you could put in a request for such and such, this, which, you know, you hadn't thought of and might be a good, you know, very interesting request. But also sometimes I would be talking to FOI officers who would persuade me, and I think they were sincere, actually putting in a request for such and such, you might think is a good idea. It's a waste of time because blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And it was, you know, and then again, it would it would save time. I mean, I just to give one sort of particular organizational example of this, you know, in the first few years of FOI, you had the this the Association of Chief Police Officers, as it was then, had this unit, this central FOI unit, who were actually really helpful in terms of you could phone them up and say, We're thinking of doing this, and they would say, Well, you know, the piece of jargon for that is such and such, or police forces don't actually hold that information, so it's a waste of time, but they might hold this information instead. Or, you know, they might say sometimes we tell people not to answer that request, and we might say, Well, we're going to do it anyway, and they'd say, Fine. But it was a perfectly straightforward discussion, which actually I think at the end of the day saved a lot of people time and aggravation. And yeah, I mean, with that has all gone now in terms of the police, that kind of stuff doesn't exist anymore. But where it does exist in public authorities, I think it's really useful.

Ibrahim Hasan 25:05

I agree that uh I think picking up the phone is a good option. Now, just going back to your experience, Martin, you've taken cases all the way to the tribunal. What's that experience taught you?

Martin Rosenbaum 25:16

Yeah, I've taken quite a few cases to the tribunal, and I've won some and I've lost some, but I have to say that I think on the whole, I've been impressed by how the tribunal has dealt with cases, and where I have lost, you know, I haven't felt I've been treated unfairly in any way, and obviously where I've won, I don't think that. But I think one of the things that that whole process has taught me is actually how with the FOI system, there's so much value in persistence, there's so much value in pursuing things that you don't get at the first stage, and how often you get more information at subsequent stages. So, in a way, this this is first of all at the internal review stage, you know, often at an internal review stage, you get information you didn't get at the first stage. Then when you go to the ICO, and I've talked about cases where the ICO has ruled in my favor, but even when the ICO doesn't, taking a case to the tribunal, you've got a reasonable chance if you've got a good case of getting information at the tribunal stage, which you didn't get before. At all these stages, there's a reasonable chance of getting information you didn't get initially. Partly, I think, because people have imposed exemptions in too blanket away at earlier stages. And once you, you know, the more stages you go through, often the more the granular detail in which the information is assessed as to what should be released and what shouldn't be released. And people have sometimes done that too blanket away initially, and then there's more scrutiny at a later level. So I think the fact that we can take cases to a tribunal in this way is a very good thing. And I've, you know, I've done these representing myself. I'm not a lawyer, but obviously, you know, I do have good knowledge of FOI law and some experience now of dealing with cases at the tribunal level. And I think it's perfectly feasible for individuals to represent themselves and to present a good case to the tribunal and sometimes win. And it's a good feature of the FOI system.

Ibrahim Hasan 27:16

Can you give us some examples of uh victories at the tribunal that you're particularly proud of?

Martin Rosenbaum 27:21

Yeah, so I mean, one which was quite recently, and this was uh since I left the the BBC, but it was a I still write material journalistically, was the nomination that was given by Boris Johnson uh for uh two peers, Charlotte Owen and Ross Kempsel. And I wanted to see the citation, the reasons that were given for why these people had been made people in the House of Lords, where they actually have the right to vote on legislation, they have political power, they're voting on laws that all of us then have to obey. What were the official reasons that were provided by Boris Johnson as to why they should be in the House of Lords?

Ibrahim Hasan 28:02

Yes, Charlotte Owen was a particularly controversial one, wasn't it? Because she was so young and it seemed that she had very little experience.

Martin Rosenbaum 28:08

Absolutely. I mean, so there's nothing really in her CV that pointed to the level of seniority or authority or experience which would suggest that she is someone who should be in the House of Lords. When I, you know, I I and I I did eventually get the citation. I was turned down, this initial request was turned down by the House of Lords Appointments Commission. It was turned down by the ICO who went against me, but the tribunal ruled that this information should be released in the public interest, which I think is absolutely the right decision. And the reasons that were given for why she should be in the House of Lords were really very, very thin indeed, and you know, didn't amount to, in my view, justification as to why she should be someone who is making laws for the rest of us. So, you know, that took a long battle, but it seemed to me absolutely the public should know why people are being made into legislators, uh, and the tribunal took the right decision in the end.

Ibrahim Hasan 29:08

So it's been around for over two decades now, Martin. Now, with open data dashboards, AI-driven systems, what do you see as the new challenges or opportunities uh when it comes to FOI?

Martin Rosenbaum 29:22

Well, I'm sure AI, as in the same way it's going to affect everything, will affect the the world of FOI. And I, you know, I know FOI officers talk about how they're read already reading FOI requests that have clearly been written by AI, and we're seeing some evidence of an increase in numbers of FOI requests.

Ibrahim Hasan 29:44

I read the post on LinkedIn from the Scottish Information Commissioner. He'd seen a massive increase in appeals and requests as well. And partly he was saying it was as a result of uh Chat GPT and and other generative AI solutions making it much easier for people. Uh absolutely.

Martin Rosenbaum 30:03

I think there's you yeah, and I did a survey of various other complaints bodies. Ombudsmen say that you know the financial services ombudsmen and the housing ombudsmen and things like that, so outside FOI, but also complaints bodies. And amongst them, over the past few months or so or year, there's evidence of increasing numbers of complaints, and it makes absolutely you know sense. People enter into ChatGPT, how can I complain about this? And ChatGPT says, you know, this is what you do. Would you like me to write your complaint for you? Blah, and makes everything so simple. So it's undoubtedly leading to more complaints, more FOI requests, and so on, which will uh, I'm sure for some public authorities, create an issue. But also, I think, you know, public authorities themselves are the talking about and thinking about how can they use AI in order to try and uh process all sorts of incoming questions, including FOI requests. How can they get more productivity out of AI systems and use them more efficiently than their current systems? So, you know, there's AI on both sides of the fence there. How that will work out in due course obviously remains to be seen. We don't yet know. So I think it's it's very difficult to predict, but clearly AI will have quite a considerable impact on both sides of the FOI operation there. For sure.

Ibrahim Hasan 31:28

And where do you see FOI going forward in in terms of how it develops? What change would you, as a journalist, want to see?

Martin Rosenbaum 31:38

So I think uh one very interesting thing here and one thing I would very much like to see is that FOI is extended to private companies who are delivering public services. Because obviously, what we've seen over the past 20 years or so is a big program of outsourcing where a lot of public services, all sorts of different kinds, you know, at the local level particularly, are uh delivered by private companies. Those private companies are outside FOI, and the government has indicated that it's in a loose kind of way that it's planning to bring them within FOI, but there's no kind of saying this for uh well quite a lot of years.

Ibrahim Hasan 32:19

Obviously, when they couldn't do anything about it, they were used to make a big play about uh housing associations and uh PFI contractors, but we've not heard anything in terms of actual legislation.

Martin Rosenbaum 32:31

Exactly correct. There's no time scale uh has been provided for this. Uh it's certainly not an immediate priority. Whether it will happen or not, therefore, I don't know. On housing associations, actually, they have introduced a kind of partial. I mean, this is something that the conservatives were doing and has was continued with. They've introduced a kind of partial information rights law which gives certain residents of housing associations rights to information about the functioning of the housing association. Rather, it's not an FOI law in the sense that anyone would have that kind of information. But you're right, absolutely right. This is something that they've has been talked about for a long time. We don't know when it will happen. We don't really know if it will happen, but I do think it would be a very important reform if it did, and it's something that would be a good thing.

Ibrahim Hasan 33:19

And perhaps a time limit on uh when a public authority wants clarification, so that as you said earlier, they don't wait 19 days.

Martin Rosenbaum 33:28

Uh absolutely. I mean, what the law actually says is that people should deal with FOI requests promptly, and the 20 working days is a kind of backstop. So prompt is a difficult word to enforce, but I think actually let's, you know, public authority should comply with the law and be prompt rather than leaving everything to the 20 working days.

Ibrahim Hasan 33:49

What's your single best piece of advice for anyone making an FY request? Can I give you two pieces of advice? Absolutely, Art. Yes.

Martin Rosenbaum 33:58

So one is just think clearly about what you really want. And the second is talk to people. So, you know, if you're the FOI officer or the journalists, talk to each other, but also if you're the journalist or the requester, talk to other people about it to check that what your the way you're trying to phrase your request really does actually make sense.

Ibrahim Hasan 34:21

So finally, Martin, I've had a look at your book, Freedom of Information: a practical guide, an excellent piece of work. What inspired you to write the book, Martin?

Martin Rosenbaum 34:31

So, what really inspired me was I'd spent over 15 years at the BBC, really as the sort of leading specialist in BBC News, in putting in FOI requests, training other journalists in how to do it, advising journalists from other programs who would come to me and talk about what they were doing and so on. And I felt, first of all, that I had a great deal of experience and I'd learned a lot during that 15 years. And what I really wanted to do was actually put that down on paper in order to help others so that I could communicate the benefits of what I'd learnt. And also because of the way in which people had come to me and helped for assist asked for assistance, I thought I had a pretty good idea of what were some of the pitfalls that other people had been falling into, what they needed to know to avoid falling into those pitfalls and to ask better requests in future. And overall, really what I wanted to do, I wanted to write the book, which, if it had I'd been able to read it when I had first started out, would have saved me so many problems, so many things that I myself got wrong in that kind of learning process because it encapsulated all the experience of learning how to do things better.

Ibrahim Hasan 35:46

And and the great thing, especially for people making FY requests, is that you've got the request template. So they're not starting from scratch. And we'll be putting link to the book and also your website in the show's notes. Yeah, thank you very much. That's all for today's episode of Guardians of Data. A huge thank you to Martin Rosenbaum for sharing his experience, insights, and stories from a career spent championing the public's right to know. Freedom of information remains one of the most vital mechanisms for transparency in public life. Martin's work reminds us it isn't just about information and documents, it's about democracy in action. And the FOI Act could be under threat. The Financial Times recently reported that government officials were brainstorming the possibility of weakening the act on costs and national security grounds. And an FOI disclosure by the ICO to the law firm Mishkon Daraya suggests that the ICO has considered a suite of provisions which would have the effect of reducing the impact of requests on public authorities. Links to these stories, along with Martin's book, are in the show's notes. If you found today's discussion useful, please subscribe, share this podcast with colleagues, and leave us a review. And remember, whether you're a seasoned professional or just starting out in information governance, there's always more to learn. And we'll be here to help you stay ahead of the curve. Thank you for listening, and join us next time on Guardians of Data.