FOI/202000031320 · FOI/EIR · partially withheld
Welfare and condition of livestock transported to Europe: EIR release
Information requested
all correspondence of any kind relating to the research into the welfare and condition of calves transported to Europe from or via Scotland. Specifically - but not limited to - all documents relating to research conducted by vets working for the Scottish Government, working with Scottish based livestock transporters and livestock importers in Spain.
Response
As the information you have requested is ‘environmental information’ for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA. This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.
An exception under regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal data) applies to information that has been redacted from the documents which are being released to you. This exception applies because the information is personal data of a third person and disclosing it would contravene the data protection principles in Article 5(1) of the General Data Protection Regulation and in section 34(1) of the Data Protection Act 2018. This exception is not subject to the ‘public interest test’, so we are not required to consider if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exception. An exception under regulation 6(1)(b) of the EIRs (information publicly available) also applies to information related to your enquiry which is already publicly available and easily accessible to you in another format. This information can be found at the following URLs: Communications with P&O Ferries since May 2016: FOI Release published on 31 October 2018 at https://www.gov.scot/publications/foi-18-02636/ Research to provide scientific evidence on calf welfare after transportation: FOI Release published on 7 January 2019 at https://www.gov.scot/publications/foi-18-03682/
About FOI
The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.
Detected exemption language
We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA. This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This exception applies because the information is personal data of a third person and disclosing it would contravene the data protection principles in Article 5(1) of the General Data Protection Regulation and in section 34(1) of the Data Protection Act 2018.