EIR/202600505234 · FOI/EIR · partially withheld
Transport Scotland - Aberdeen to Central Belt Rail Journey Improvement Project Liaison Group meeting information: EIR release
Information requested
All minutes, meeting notes, action notes, agendas, attendance lists, and papers (including any slide decks or briefing papers circulated to attendees) for meetings of the “Aberdeen to Central Belt Rail Journey Improvement Project Liaison Group” (including any similarly named group relating to the same project), for the period from 1 January 2023 to the date of this request.
Where any minutes or notes are not held, please provide any alternative records of the meeting outcomes, such as action logs, decision logs, readouts, summaries, or follow-up emails that record what was discussed and agreed.
Please include records held by the Scottish Government and any records held on its behalf by partner organisations or contractors where the Scottish Government has the right to obtain them.
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.
Please find attached to this document Annex, which contains the information you have requested that we identified as falling in the scope of your request. Whilst we aim to provide information wherever possible, you will see that some of the information has been redacted. This has been done in line with the following exceptions under EIR regulations:
Regulation 10(5)(e) - Confidentiality of commercial or industrial information
An exemption under regulation 10(5)(e) confidentiality of commercial or industrial information applies to some of the information you have requested. This exemption applies because disclosure would, or would be likely to, cause substantial harm to commercial interests of Network Rail and by extension to Transport Scotland as funder of Network Rail’s operations in Scotland.
This exemption recognises the need for public bodies to protect the commercial interests and economic interests. Disclosure of some of the financial information, which is linked to the delivery of the Aberdeen to the Central Belt Service Improvements Project, could significantly affect the commercial interests of Network Rail as the delivery agent and procuring entity, who engages with contractors in a commercial environment and to Transport Scotland, as the funder.
This exception 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 exception. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exception.
We recognise there is a public interest in disclosing information as part of open, transparent and accountable government, and to inform public debate. However, there is a greater public interest in protecting commercial interests of Network Rail. Disclosure of this information would be likely to undermine the commercial ability of Network Rail and Transport Scotland, which would affect the public spend, thus having a negative impact on taxpayers’ money, which would not be in public interest.
Regulation 11(2) – Personal data relating to third party
An exemption under regulation 11(2) personal information of the EIRs applies to some of the information requested because it is personal data of a third party, i.e. names and contact details of individuals, 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 the redacted information is cleared marked.
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), 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 has been done in line with the following exceptions under EIR regulations: Regulation 10(5)(e) - Confidentiality of commercial or industrial information An exemption under regulation 10(5)(e) confidentiality of commercial or industrial information applies to some of the information you have requested.