Freedom of Information (FoI) requests from profit-making enterprises are costing local authorities thousands of pounds in legal costs, delegates to the annual Solicitors in Local Government conference in Exeter were told last weekend.


Calderdale Council chief law and administration officer Bernadette Livesey said her department had received 29 FoI requests in the first quarter of 2008 - compared to just ten in the same period last year - mainly from various media outlets including the BBC.



'Why should council tax payers also be subsidising the BBC's research?' Livesey questioned. 'Five requests were from companies in the business of gathering intelligence and selling it on to the media. Do council tax payers really want to spend thousands of pounds helping a private company get richer?'



Livesey said that, in addition to the expense of their lawyers' time, many local authorities - including her own - have had to recruit two or more extra staff specifically to process FoI requests. 'They have to be sufficiently high calibre to cope with intricate legislation - so it's costing big money in salary bills.'



She added: 'Lawyers recognise that free access to information is a good thing, but we are at risk of being swamped by FoI.'



Jonathan Rayner