You may have recently received an email from foi2@publicprocurementreviewservice.co.uk making a Freedom of Information request for data held by your local council on RM6281 Workforce Alliance Framework for Social Services (Lot 4).

This appears to have been sent to many if not all Parish and Town Councils in England as a blanket request.

As this is a Freedom of Information Act request, you are required to respond.

You may want to consider the following when considering a response:

As a Local Town or Parish Council, this isn't relevant to you and so you are not likely to hold any information.

However, before you decide that you don’t hold any recorded information, you should make sure that you have carried out adequate and properly directed searches of your records, and that you have convincing reasons for concluding that no recorded information is held. If an applicant complains to the ICO that you haven’t identified all the information you hold, they will consider the scope, quality and thoroughness of your searches and test the strength of your reasoning and conclusions.

If you don’t have the information the Requestor has asked for, you can comply with the request by informing them in writing. If you know that the information is held by another public authority, you could transfer the request to them or advise the requester to redirect their request. Part 2 of the section 45 code of practice provides advice on good practice in transferring requests for information Finding and preparing the information | ICO. 

We advise responding to let the Requestor know that, as a Local Council, it is not within your remit to deliver services that fall within the RM6281 Framework.  However, you can also let them know that you have checked all of your records for any reference to this and that you suggest that they approach Lincolnshire County Council, as they will have responsibility to deliver services that are referenced in the FOI request.  For best practice to respond use the LALC ‘Freedom of Information decision’ template in our Document Templates area.

Kind regards

Your team at LALC