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By Steve Ranger, 7 April 2006 15:20

NEWS

Government bodies received 7,700 Freedom of Information (FoI) requests between September and December last year, the lowest quarterly total since the law came into effect.

Just under 4,000 requests were made to government departments and the other 3,750 requests were made to other "monitored bodies". Around 90 per cent of requests have been processed.

The 7,700 requests in the fourth quarter compares to 13,600 during the first quarter of 2005, 8,400 during the second and 8,100 during the third.

"These figures suggest that there was a marked initial peak in request volumes during the first quarter of the FoI Act's implementation," the Department for Constitutional Affairs said in a statement.

During the fourth quarter, 89 per cent of requests were processed within the statutory deadline or were subject to a permitted deadline extension.

Of the requests where it was possible to make a decision on whether to release the information being sought, 67 per cent were granted in full, the same as during the third quarter.

Of the remaining requests, 10 per cent of the total were withheld in part, 16 per cent were withheld in full, and the remaining seven per cent had not yet received a response.