FOI/19/00022 Review · FOI · partially withheld
Subscription/Shareholders Agreement referenced June 2018 loan, Ferguson Marine Engineering Limited: FOI review
Information requested
Provide a copy of the Subscription and Shareholders Agreement referenced in the June 2018 loan agreement to Ferguson Marine Engineering Limited (FMEL).
Response
I have concluded that the original decision should be confirmed, with modifications. This is because most of this information is already in the public domain and not sufficiently commercially sensitive.
A copy of the Subscription and Shareholders Agreement referenced in the June 2018 loan agreement to Ferguson Marine Engineering Limited can now be released in part and is attached to this email.
For the remainder of the information, I have concluded that the exemption was correctly applied and that the public interest test remains in favour of the information being withheld. It is my view that this information is sufficiently commercially sensitive such that it should not be released, for the reasons explained to you in our original response. It is not in the public interest that a company’s competitors gain an advantage on future similar tendering exercises, to the detriment of that company, nor that the Scottish Government is left unable to ensure that we are always able to obtain the best value for public money when tendering for contracts. For these reasons I am content that this information has been correctly withheld.
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
For the remainder of the information, I have concluded that the exemption was correctly applied and that the public interest test remains in favour of the information being withheld.