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NORTH WALTHAM PRIMARY SCHOOL

POLICY FOR FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT

The school strives to be open and accountable by providing relevant information on a regular and timely basis to parents, the community and its other stakeholders.

Purpose

This document sets out how North Waltham Primary School complies with the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FoIA), under which schools have a duty to provide assistance and advice to anyone requesting information.

Method of Achievement

In November 2004, the Governors adopted the Model Scheme for Publication of School documents.  Other than confidential minutes, all documentation will be available either in hardcopy format or via the school website when completed.  This policy is subject to annual review.

This policy should be read in conjunction with the document/information retention schedule.

All the staff and governors are made aware of the requirements of the FoIA and how the school handles requests for information and will be advised of any changes to these.  The requirements of the Act will form part of the induction process for new members of staff.

Requests for information must be made in writing (including fax and e-mail), have the name and correspondence address of the enquirer and have details of the information required.  The enquirer will be told if the school or governing body hold information except where certain exemptions apply (see Appendix A).

In meeting the school’s obligations to provide help and guidance we will:

The approval of the application of other exemptions and the undertaking of the public interest test when applying qualified exemptions will be dealt with by the Headteacher and or the chair of governors as appropriate.

The implementation of the day to day policy is delegated to the Headteacher.  We will endeavour to provide a response to requests within 20 working days, excluding school holidays.  Where circumstances make it difficult for the information to be provided within this time limit, we will advise the enquirer accordingly and seek to provide the information as soon as possible.  All requests will be logged by the School Administrator and their progress tracked and reported to the Governing Body.

The log will record all requests for information (including the date received), fees received (where applicable) and the date that the information was provided.  It will also include a record of any exemptions applied and, where appropriate, the reasons for this.

Any expressions of dissatisfaction about the way in which a request for information has been handled by the school or the Governing Body will be dealt with via the school’s existing complaints policy.

Appendix B provides a checklist for the action to be taken in respect of requests for information.

Charging Structure

A flat fee of £2.50 will be charged per copy requested.  This will include postage which will normally be second class unless otherwise requested by the enquirer.  The Governing Body will consider complying with a request for information where the charge for staff time exceeds the threshold of £450 (see below) if the applicant is willing to pay the costs and as long as the work load involved does not adversely affect any aspect of the school’s or Governing Body’s service provision.

Staff time can only be charged for where the cost threshold of £450 is exceeded.  The costs threshold is the limit at which the school/Governing Body does not have to comply with a request.  The costs that can be taken into account when calculating if the threshold is going to be reached are: the staff time taken to establish if the information is held, to locate it, copy it and to send it to the applicant and postage costs.  Staff costs are calculated using a figure of £25 per hour for each member of staff needed to deal with the request i.e. 18 staff hours.

If the calculation comes to less than £450, the only charge will be the flat fee.

Date approved ………………………………..

Signed ……………………………………  (Chair/Vice Chair)

Review: May 2008