Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 13 November 2013

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Public Expenditure and Reform

Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed)

5:10 pm

Photo of Richard Boyd BarrettRichard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

To the members of the committee, he stated:



On fees and vexatious requests, the issue is understanding what makes a vexatious request vexatious. We should not be conflating a vexatious request with one that is a little difficult, annoying, embarrassing or persistent. For example, one cannot have a vexatious requester. The Commons justice committee examined how someone who made a lot of freedom of application requests could be classified as a vexatious requester. That is a point we strongly argue against. Just because someone makes a lot of requests does not necessarily mean they are not valid or valuable. Just because a person may have made a vexatious request once before does not mean future requests will be vexatious.
He gave an example of a request to all councils in Britain on how much they spent on biscuits, which request one could construe as vexatious. He pointed out, however-----

Comments

No comments

Log in or join to post a public comment.