Committee
Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee 06 November 2025
06 Nov 2025 · S6 · Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee
Item of business
Freedom of Information Reform (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Dr Worthy
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A frequent cause of frustration relates to timeliness and delays, which is an issue that the bill deals with. Requesters want their information to be provided within the timescale that is set by the law. The bill makes an important change on proactive disclosure, which is the idea that people should be able to find the information on an organisation’s website without making a request, but, if they have to make a request, it will be answered in a timely fashion.
Getting information to people in good time was one of the positive requirements of the act, but it is one of the most common forms of delay, and that is not only the case for individual requests. Lots of freedom of information laws slow down over time. Kevin Dunion can probably speak about this much better than I can, but, once delays start infecting the system, they start happening all over the place. The system starts to slow down and get delegitimised, so people get frustrated and are less willing to use it.
In the same item of business
The Convener
Lab
Our next agenda item is an evidence-taking session on the Freedom of Information Reform (Scotland) Bill at stage 1, for which we are joined by Katy Clark MSP...
Dr Ben Worthy (Birkbeck College)
Yes, indeed. Can you hear me okay?
The Convener
Lab
We can, thank you.
Dr Worthy
By international standards, the Scottish freedom of information law performs quite well. The data that is available shows that there are high levels of reque...
The Convener
Lab
Excellent. Thank you, Ben. Erin, can I come to you?
Dr Erin Ferguson (University of Aberdeen)
I largely agree with what Dr Worthy has said. The Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 is largely working as intended, and it has resulted in a high vo...
The Convener
Lab
Thank you. Kevin, is there anything that you would like to add?
Professor Kevin Dunion
I agree with both witnesses. When the 2002 act came into effect, we saw it as being very positive compared with the legislation in other countries. For examp...
The Convener
Lab
That was very helpful. Thank you for those introductory remarks. Picking up on what you have just said, Professor Dunion, I point out that a substantial num...
Professor Dunion
I am not sure that it encompasses all of them. Katy Clark can speak to this, but the bill has changed over time in response to soundings that have been taken...
The Convener
Lab
Are you confident that, even if it does not quite cover all the previous recommendations, the bill will move us substantially forward? Will it allow us to ca...
Professor Dunion
It tackles the most obvious deficiencies that have emerged because of the passage of time. That is the most important part of it.
The Convener
Lab
That was helpful. Ben, I was going to ask you the same question, but you also mentioned the international reputation that Scotland’s freedom of information ...
Dr Worthy
Yes, I think that it will. As Kevin Dunion has said, one of the really important things that the bill does is bring the law up to date and make it ready for ...
The Convener
Lab
We will explore that later. Erin Ferguson, I want to put both questions to you. What will the bill do for our international reputation? Will it move us forw...
Dr Ferguson
Yes, the bill is certainly a step towards modernisation. Even within the past 20 years, technology has moved on quite rapidly, so having additional requireme...
The Convener
Lab
Given the current environment, what are the major barriers that prevent people from accessing their information? We have talked about up-front publication—we...
Dr Worthy
A frequent cause of frustration relates to timeliness and delays, which is an issue that the bill deals with. Requesters want their information to be provide...
Dr Ferguson
I agree with that. In some of the empirical research that I conducted, which involved speaking to journalists about their use of freedom of information, I fo...
The Convener
Lab
That is helpful.
Professor Dunion
The assumption was that FOI would help to usher in a cultural change—a move towards a culture of openness. We have a culture of compliance, which is positive...
The Convener
Lab
Therefore, what is required is the next supportive step to move from compliance—“I will comply because I have to, and I will comply absolutely”—towards an en...
Professor Dunion
Yes, that is right, and that means writing and preparing documents in the expectation that they will go into the public domain. One of the difficulties with ...
Sue Webber (Lothian) (Con)
Con
Some of the respondents to the committee’s call for views suggested that the proposal will not change the legal position of information that is disclosed und...
The Convener
Lab
Do you want to direct that to Ben Worthy first?
Sue Webber
Con
I was looking straight at Professor Dunion. Laughter.
The Convener
Lab
Oh, I am sorry.
Professor Dunion
Some of the amendments highlight or emphasise what can perhaps be read into the legislation. On the first question that we were asked about the presumption o...
Dr Worthy
Broadly, all these provisions point in the direction of openness. How open is a question about implementation, of course, but they all point in the direction...
Dr Ferguson
I read some of the responses that you were referring to, and I think that some of the confusion was due to the fact that people were a bit unclear about the ...