letter to Information Commissioner re FOI request - DoH - Wells report on NHSU

As I have still not received a response from the Department of Health following my appeal, under the Freedom of Information Act, against their refusal to disclose the report written by Sir William Wells into the NHS University see: entry on 18th Feb

I have now written to the Information Commissioner to complain - a copy of the letter is below:

FOI/EIR Complaints Resolution
Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF

7.4.05
Dear Sir/Madam,

I wish to complain about and appeal the actions of the Department of Health (DoH) in respect to my application for disclosure, under the Freedom of Information Act, of the report written by Sir William Wells into the NHS University (NHSu).

I enclose a letter (dated 9th Nov 2004 Ref: PO5005693) from John Hutton, minister of state at the DoH in which he states an “intention to publish the findings shortly”.

As this had not been published I submitted a letter to the DoH on 1st Jan 2005 (copy enclosed) requesting disclosure of this report.

I did not hear from the DoH until I received a letter dated 14th Feb (ref: TO6011201, copy enclosed) stating they had decided not to disclose the report and citing section 33of the Act – Audit functions as the reason for non disclosure.

I then wrote (copy enclosed) to Jill Moorcroft (FOI officer at the DoH) on 18th Feb requesting an internal review of the decision.

I have not received any acknowledgement or decision from her, and it has now been more than the six weeks I understand is considered a reasonable time to respond.

I wish to complain, both about the time taken to respond to my request and the original decision by the DoH not to disclose the information requested.

Yours sincerely,


Rod Ward