EIR/202400440963 · FOI/EIR · partially withheld
Land Reform (Scotland) Bill correspondence: EIR release
Information requested
1. “All mentions of the terms “Ed Mountain”, “Edward Mountain”, “NZET Convener”, “NZET Committee Convener”, “Net Zero Convener”, “Net Zero Committee Convener”, “Net Zero, Energy and Transport Convener” and “Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee Convener” by Mairi Gougeon (or anyone in her private office), Fiona Hyslop (or anyone in her private office) or special adviser Kate Higgins in emails, letters, WhatsApps or sent since 1 September 2024. Please use the alternative spelling ‘convenor’ for each of the aforementioned terms where convener is referenced.”
2. “Please provide all correspondence between the civil servants and Scottish Ministers working on the Land Reform (Scotland) Bill and special adviser Kate Higgins since 1 September 2024. This should include all meetings that she has attended with these civil servants and the minutes of those meetings, any email, WhatsApps, letters or notes exchanged and any other form of documented correspondence between civil servants/ministers working on the Land Reform Bill and Kate Higgins since 1 September 2024.”
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) to reflect that this is being handled under EIRS rather than 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.
We have treated your request as two separate questions and provided a two-part response as follows.
Part 1 of your request
We have interpreted your request for “mentions” of the terms you specify to mean where the specific terms are included in the body, subject line or email chain of emails, letters or WhatsApp messages by the individuals you identify or their private offices and have provided a count of such communications in our response.
The answer to your question is:
Cabinet Secretary for Transport - Ms Fiona Hyslop (or anyone in her private office):
Mention of terms/ medium Emails Letters WhatsApp Ed Mountain Edward Mountain NZET Convener NZET Committee Convener Net Zero Convener Net Zero Committee Convener Net Zero, Energy and Transport Convener Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee Convener 93 (collectively) 0 0
Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Land Reform and Islands - Ms Mairi Gougeon (or anyone in her private office):
Mention of terms/ medium Emails Letters WhatsApp Ed Mountain 0 0 0 Edward Mountain 8 15 0 NZET Convener 6 0 0 NZET Committee Convener 8 0 0 Net Zero Convener 8 0 0 Net Zero Committee Convener 0 0 0 Net Zero, Energy and Transport Convener 0 0 0 Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee Convener 0 0 0
Senior Special Adviser for Transport Portfolio and coordination and liaison for local government and trade unions - Kate Higgins:
Mention of terms/ medium Emails Letters WhatsApp Ed Mountain 3 0 0 Edward Mountain 6 0 0 NZET Convener 27 0 0 NZET Committee Convener 27 0 0 Net Zero Convener 61 0 0 Net Zero Committee Convener 55 0 0 Net Zero, Energy and Transport Convener 57 0 0 Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee Convener 22 0 0
Please note that these search results may contain duplicates given that the key phrases you noted may have been used indistinctly within the same correspondence. And same correspondence may have spawn within various emails chains as the discussions evolved, related to the same subject, therefore generating multiple similar correspondence.
If you are interested in a particular topic, I would suggest you specify in your request/s the subject matter/s you are interested in as that would narrow down the scope of searches and be able to provide a more accurate response.
Part 2 of your request
I enclose copies of some of the information you requested.
While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance we are unable to provide some of the information you have requested because exceptions under regulations 10(4)(e) (internal communications) and 11(1) (personal information) of the EIRs applies to that information. The reasons why these exceptions apply are explained in the Annex to this letter.
The information within Annexes E and F of Item 5 is available, respectively, on the following Scottish Parliament webpages: https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/committees/current-andprevious-committees/session-6-delegated-powers-and-law-reform-committee and https://www.parliament.scot/-/media/files/committees/delegated-powers-and-law-reformcommittee/scottish-land-and-estates-on-land-reform-bill.pdf. Under regulation 6(1)(b) of the EIRs, we do not have to give you information which is already publicly available and easily accessible to you in another form or format. If, however, you do not have internet access to obtain this information from the webpages listed, then please contact me again and I will send you a paper copy.
About FOI
The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://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) to reflect that this is being handled under EIRS rather than 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.